Spaghetti and Fruit?

Question: What do spaghetti and fruit have in common? Answer: They both spent some time in my dehydrator this week.

This week in my world of dehydration, I dehydrated spaghetti, apple slices, pineapple (purchased for $.99 each) and fruit roll-ups. My dehydrator was BUSY!

First item to be dehydrated this week was four servings of leftover spaghetti (4 ounces each) made with produce from my garden and deer sausage from the deer John shot last fall. Yummmmmm! Boy will this taste good after a long day of paddling. (I still need to figure out how to take garlic bread – what a treat that would be!)

Next on the agenda was dehydrated apple slices. I used my handy-dandy apple peeler, corer, slicer from Pampered Chef  http://www.pamperedchef.com to slice and sometimes peel. I left the peeling on half (keep all the nutrients) and peeled the other half (in case I want to hydrate them to use in baking).  After placing the slice on the dehydrating tray, I sprinkled them with cinnamon.

Then on to  the roll-ups…. I made two different varieties. The first was apple pie fruit leathers http://mywholefoodlife.com/2013/08/25/apple-pie-fruit-leathers/ . I used freshly made pear/applesauce. They were GREAT! The next variety was pumpkin apple pie fruit roll ups (Do you see a pattern here?) http://www.gettystewart.com/how-to-make-homemade-fruit-roll-ups-pumpkin-and-apple-pie-flavor/ . I included the same pear/applesauce from the previous roll-ups, pumpkin and butternut squash from my freezer. (Butternut squash is a great substitute for pumpkin.) These were also a big hit. – we may eat better on this trip than we do at home. Total count = 89. Who will have only 44?

What I learned this week…..

• When vacuum sealing the spaghetti, place  the spaghetti in a freezer bag  and then insert it into the Foodsaver roll  – then proceed with sealing as usual. When dehydrated, spaghetti becomes sharp and sometimes will poke a hole in the Foodsaver bags. Using this process helps eliminate this problem.
• Spread the fruit roll-ups the same width as the plastic wrap, making rolling easier.
• Roll the fruit-roll ups and then cut.

Hmmm….  What shall I tackle next week?