Dehydrating Celery

How many of you love celery, especially ants on a log? Eating celery is a nice healthy snack but, it does not last very long in the refrigerator. How many times have you thrown out your celery because it is getting limp or soft? Today I want to show you how to save your celery instead of throwing it away and wasting half or more of it.

Last week one of my husband’s employees was going to throw her celery out, but I said I would take it and use it for soups. She asked me why I would want limp celery? I said I would dehydrate it and use it later when I was going to make soups.

Today I will show you how I Dehydrate celery.

1.       First, bring out your dehydrator and place one tray on the bottom with your fruit roll-up tray. This will be the tray that catches anything that falls through as you are dehydrating your cut up celery.

2.       Cut off any ends that are dark. Start slicing your celery thin and cutting into little pieces. Do not throw out the leaves these can be cut up and dehydrated along with your celery pieces.

3.     

  Place your second tray on top of your empty tray with the fruit roll-up insert on it. Place your cut up pieces of celery and leaves around the tray.

4.      

My heat source is on top so, I put another empty tray on top of my full tray of celery. This will prevent any celery getting caught in the motor and wreaking your machine.

5.      

When your celery and leaves are very dry to the touch and can be crunched, you can then place the dried celery and leaves in an airtight zip-lock bag or an airtight container. Always check your dehydrator for temperature and about how much time it will take to dehydrate your celery.

I hate to waste food so when this employee wanted to just throw it away I decided to take it home and dehydrate it. I will take it into work and show her what I have done with the leftover food she wanted to throw away. I always try to find a way to preserve my leftovers or use them instead of wasting food and throwing it away. Now I will have celery for soups for a while without having to go buy it from the store.

I hope you enjoy this very easy way to preserve wilting celery from Suzie Homemaker.