Sunday 24 August 2014

Harvesting, dehydrating and a surprise ...

After several of our red pears fell off the tree (unfortunately there is gravel underneath), we decided to pick them all. The left kitchen window has the good pears and some of our Tigerella tomatoes:
Whilst the right one has the damaged pears and more of our tomatoes:
All those tomatoes have now gone into the dehydrator (2 trays):
One layer had ground black pepper sprinkled on, the other paprika. I'm hoping the flavours will impart themselves into the tomatoes as they dry. I didn't want to risk salt as that would dry more moistness out and make them tough. A 3rd tray had some of our pears and a sliced cooking apple put in as a test.

Coming home from a walk around the village, we found these on our doorstep:
5 Bramley and 1 Howgate Wonder cooking apples (I think), plus two huge punnet's of cultivated blackberries. Our neighbour R, told us he had put something on our doorstep as he saw us walking around. This is the 3rd punnet from him to go into our freezer, yum yum!

Update on the tomatoes, most dried really well but as I was rushing to get them finished (I know, shouldn't have started), I decided to open freeze this batch for safety. The next lot I do will be dried completely and stored in a jar. I'm not sure if the black pepper or paprika added anything so won't bother again. I did try one though on the way to the freezer, and dehydrating them certainly intensifies the flavour!









4 comments:

  1. Ooooh A dehydrator.. I'm jealous! So useful for the glut.
    Gill

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  2. I am still trying to get to grips with it!

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  3. Oooh you seem to be going all guns out with trying new things. Flavouring experiments eh? You'll be queen of the dehydrator in no time x

    I think I need to clean my window sills lol. I love my cats dearly but they are never without a paw mark and now I feel shamed....

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Luckily for the fruit, we had cleaned the windows and sills a couple of weeks before they we're put on!

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