How To Make Your Own Dehydrated Bananas

Dehydrating any types of fruit, and especially dehydrating bananas, can be a very difficult task. Do you really want to have your oven on for 15 hours at a temperature of 130 Degrees Fahrenheit may dry them fine, but they just do not taste very nice? Unfortunately, when dehydrating bananas they lose a lot of their flavor, and you are often left with a faintly sweet, spongy feeling disc of fruit. But those bananas which have been dehydrated commercially are beautifully crunchy and taste great. However, the way they are produced is not good for those who are extremely conscious about what they eat, as they are deep-fried. What happens is that the slices of banana are deep-fried in coconut oil and then dipped into sugar water to provide that glistening sheen to them. So as you can see producing dehydrated bananas takes more than just using high temperatures and lots of patience, and surely there is a much healthier way of cooking them that does not involve us using fat. Well, hopefully the recipe shown below will produce the ideal dehydrated banana without removing any of the fruit’s flavor and nutrients. Firstly, cut the bananas into equal sized slices and place them on a mesh sheet. Now soak them in some fresh lemon juice for about 5 minutes (however, any citrus juice will do, so if you want to use any time of unscented juice that you like). To dehydrate them place them in an oven set at 125 Degrees Fahrenheit for 18 hours and take them, out of the oven as soon as they have become pliable and are not crunchy. Remember, the ones that you purchase in stores which are crunchy are dehydrated by deep-frying them rather than actually drying them. Now that you have dehydrated your own bananas, why not try using them in alternative ways, for example add them to your banana bread to produce a pleasant zing taste in your recipe. Or why don’t you just throw them in to your next bowl of porridge or oatmeal in the morning to add a pleasant crunch and some natural sweetness, why not add some honey as well. But as you can see, making a sweet alternative healthy snack for yourself is simple and won’t taste like bits of bricks. My landlady cut her dehydrated bananas lengthwise. I did it like that for a while, but I found it tedious to cut them this way. It’s a lot easier to just slice the bananas across their length or on a diagonal. As you can see in the photo above, some end up round, others are cut a bit more on a diagonal. Truly, any of these ways work. Play around with it a bit to see what’s easiest for you when dehydrating bananas. There’s not really a rule book on how to dehydrate bananas properly — we can be a bit flexible here! I coat the sliced bananas with fresh lemon juice. This can help prevent browning, but the lemon imparts a nice tangy flavor to the bananas. When I’ve skipped this step, there have been complaints. Your mileage may vary.