How to make healthy dried snacks !
Does your family like dried fruit as snacks!
Preserving foods by drying is a great way to ensure foods don’t go bad for long trips or during warm weather. The high sugar and acid content of fruits make them safe to dry out of doors when conditions are favorable for drying. Sun dried raisins are the best known of all dried foods. Dried fruits such as dried apple slices and apricots make delicious healthy snacks. The fruit becomes very light and crispy and retains much of its original flavor. You can make your own snacks by removing moisture and create stable, nutritious snacks for your whole family. Food manufacturing plants use dried fruits in various sauce, soups, marinades, garnishes, puddings and food for infants and children.
Reasons to dehydrate dried fruits:
1. Portable
Dried food is a healthy snack that is easy to bring along wherever you go. Whether you’re on a family trip or just running errands, include a bag of dried fruit in your purse or backpack for something healthy to snack on and keep up your energy. Dried fruit slices can be mixed with nuts to create an awesome snack for hiking and exploring the outdoors.
2. Replace Salty Snacks
Many store-bought snacks such as chips and crackers contain a high amount of salt, as well as unhealthy preservatives that add toxins to the body. By drying fruits or vegetables, you can create a nutritious snack. It’s easier than you think to wean your family off potato chips and cookies if you’re offering delicious banana or apricot chips.
3. No Chemicals
Homemade dried snacks don’t contain preservatives, dyes, or other chemicals. The only thing you need to make homemade snacks is a dehydrator and almost any food. Simply cut up your favorite fruits into bite-sized slices to create a chewy dried snack that will retain its natural taste, vitamins, and minerals for months to come.
4. Efficient storage
Dried food can decrease in size to as little as one sixth of the original volume. You don’t need to make room in the freezer or refrigerator to store your dried snacks. After dehydrating, a few pounds of apples will easily fit into a sandwich bag or cloth snack bag. You can seal up your dried snacks and tuck them away in a corner of the pantry to enjoy long after fresh apples would have spoiled.
5. Raw foods
Diets based on eating a majority of raw foods have become popular, with an increase of creative recipes and foraging-based food choices. Raw food diets are much healthier in many cases because boiling, searing, and sauteing food tends to destroy a good percentage of vitamins. Natural vitamins found in foods can begin to break down as low as 115 degrees Fahrenheit. Food dehydrators can preserve your food at even lower temperatures, which means you’re also preserving all the natural fiber and nutrition in your healthy snacks.
6. Reduction of waste
Dehydrating your food allows you to preserve excessive grocery purchases and even leftovers to save you money and time. Dehydrated meals can be easily warmed up again and re-hydrated with water, broths, or soup stock. If everyone took efforts to reduce food waste it would result in lower demand, lower commercial production, and less stress food manufacturers place on the environment. Families can even go as far as growing favorite herbs or fresh vegetables such as tomatoes, potatoes, and carrots in backyard gardens. If you have an apple tree, you can preserve the majority of your apples by easily drying them for the rest of the winter.
7. Save on costs
Dehydrating food helps eliminate spoilage and waste of perishable food items so that you save money over time. You can easily get into the habit of drying extra fresh foods so they don’t spoil. You can also save money in many ways:
- Buy fresh foods in bulk and dry the excess for dry storage.
- Use your own fresh herbs and dehydrate them for flavoring your homemade recipes.
- Give your kids dried fruits such as apple and apricots slices for delicious snacks instead of sugary, salty or processed snacks.
- Make healthy snack mixes with dried fruit, nuts, and healthy chocolate bits to give as gifts.
8. Consistent quality
With your own dehydrator, you have control over which foods you choose to dry, in which quantities, and how often. You can cut and separate dried foods into portion sizes or store them in large gallon Zip-Lock bags for easy dry storage. You can serve your own dried foods and healthy snacks to guests and family with the confidence that they are perfectly healthy treats with no hidden ingredients or chemicals.
9. Buy during peak seasons
You can save more money and reduce food waste more by stocking up fresh, local produce at the farmer’s market or by buying apples from your neighbor’s apple trees. During the harvest season, pick up basics such as tomatoes, blueberries, and melons at roadside stands. Visit your area’s local markets and pick your fresh fruits to turn into delicious homemade fruit snacks. Dried fruits and vegetables are easily turned into healthy snacks, to enjoy all winter seasons.
Dehydrating food and making your own healthy snacks is something the whole family can participate in. Your family can easily enjoy the food drying process together and your kids will learn some practical life skills. Dried snacks will taste even better when you are finished!
Food dehydrators are a convenient and simple way of preserving the quality and nutrients within fresh foods. You can easily re-purpose dried food ingredients any way you like for snacks, cooking, and seasoning within recipes. Dehydrating food can easily become part of your family’s healthy lifestyle.
Know benefits of other dry fruits visit: Dry fruits Benefits
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