We are trying something new this year to save food from the garden. Because we have lots of kale and would like to preserve some of it for winter, we are dehydrating and storing it. It’s a really simple process. I picked the kale and washed it. After I took the leaves off the stems and cut it up into small pieces, I placed it between paper towels and dish towels to dry it out completely. I laid it out on the trays and put them into the dehydrator.

Set the temperature between 100-125 (I used 120F) and set the time for 4-6 hours. I checked it at 5 hours and it was finished.

We plan to use the kale to add extra nutrition to pasta sauces, soups, smoothies, and wherever else a tablespoon of delicious can be added.  When I checked outside today, I saw that there is more kale ready to go and we’ll be dehydrating more this weekend. There’s nothing like food that grows like weeds and can be stored for winter when we are all craving a little more green in our diet.

There is no need to blanch or precook the kale before drying, so it retains its color and a lot of the goodness that fresh kale contains.