Drying, Canning, Freezing

You can also make chips with zucchini and summer squash. Slice them thinly, sprinkle lightly with pizza seasoning, your favorite herbs, even cajun seasoning works good. Dry until crisp. I think mine took about 2 and 1/2 hours. Much better than potato chips.

I hate to say it, I don't know how long they last. We have never had any still around after a week.

No, I didn't get alot last year, but I am thinking of doing some this year.

Has anyone made Tomato Powder. I just figured it was tomatoes without the skin and seeds dried then put in the blender to make it into a powder.

Anyone know?

Howerver, my first question is...Has anyone ever dried Zucchini squash? Were you happy when you rehydrated and used the squash?
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hi Flu Mom...  I'm going to dry pumpkin...the colonials did it and it kept them alive.
I'll let you know.  I dried apples successfully before.

The problem with the oven is that the temperature is too high and it drys the outside of the food before the middle gets dry. Then you get mold. I have a food dehydrator and it is worth it! I have dry tomatos, apples, herbs, and pineapple.

I would look on Craigs list or ebay for a used one. Mine is over 10 years old and working great.

Littleraven ... Are you filling the jar to within a 1\2 a inch to a 1\4 of a inch of the top? If there not full, that may be causing them to float. With water bath I cover my jars with about 2 inches of water and I've never had one float. In the pressure canner it only takes a couple of inches. Mine "has a fill to line" on the inside. Sorry I couldn't be more help.

Thank you Wicker, It may be that I am not filling my jars enough--I tend to worry that the lids will not seal if I get too close and over-compensate, this combined with trying the smaller jars may be what is doing this.  I will try this on the next canning run. I think you may have solved my problem Thank you.

We'll use our sun dryer again this year.  It really dries much more evenly than my electric dehydrators.  Also, if I don't have electricity, I'll surely have sun.  We made a dehydrator that  has twelve shelves, painted all the wood black and have plexiglass on the top and front.  Have a door that latches.  Just put it in the sun and turn it to whatever direction the sun is.  Dries foods beautifully.  Hope to keep it full all summer.

Wicker - I'm not sure how to post a picture.  If someone will tell me, I'll post one.

Wicker - here's a link to a solar dehydrator you can build.  We put plexiglass on the front of ours. www.homegrownevolution.com/2008/10/build-solar-dehydrator.html

Use for all those tomatoes:

My mom has been making (don't judge it till you try it) tomato jam, for years now. Everyone who tries it likes it. We just don't tell them what it is before they try it.

I have never made any kind of jam but just two days ago I did for the first time. I was motivated because strawberries were very inexpensive and because I just don't like the taste of jam made with corn syrup. Jam made with real sugar is sooo much better and I am really liking my own jam. I did not want to get into all that canning on my first try so I made a cross between a freezer jam and a cooked jam. Obviously from a prepping point of view canned is preferable.

mercurymom wrote:   Can you post how you did it? Recipe? I just got a whole bunch of strawberries, and we've eaten about half, but I need to do something with the rest, before they get too soft. I need to learn how to start making jam and canning, the sooner the better. lol

I looked around on the internet for a recipe for a while. There are a lot out there and they mostly differ in the amount of sugar used. The freezer jams used very little sugar and one does not cook the fruit. I was afraid to try anything so different from what I was used to but I have heard that they do turn out just fine. The other recipes require that you cook the berries and sterilize the jars using stringent methods to keep germs from getting into them or you could get botulism.

I created a hybrid. I cooked the berries (probably a waste of time but I was afraid to try anything so new to me) and used the full amount of sugar and pectin but then I froze the resulting jam (except for one container that went straight into the fridge). I noticed that there are several different kinds of pectin. Not knowing which to use I got the one that was on sale. It was powdered freezer jam pectin and it worked fine. I would also point out that by making the freezer jam one does not need to use canning jars. But it also won't last if you loose power to your freezer.

I did not keep a link to the recipe I used so I can't provide it. But it had equal parts crushed berries and sugar, one packet of pectin and I cooked it for ten minutes adding the pectin in the last minute. I scooped off some of the froth as I have seen my mom do that when I was a kid. But it did not seem to make much difference that I left some on. If you make a jam out of something with a tough skin you might want to remove the skins (then it becomes jelly).

My main reason for making this was that I just don't like jam made with corn syrup; it is not as good as jam made with sugar.

Hi guys & gals;