Our new dehydrator came in! Here come treats for us and our dog~

dehydrating bananas in excalibur dehydrator on Heading Home Farms

sweet potato dog treats in dehydrator on Heading Home Farms

We are so excited that our new Excalibur Dehydrator came in this weekend. We had some orders for dog treats that we needed to get filled. Plus we did banana chips and apple slices. We sprinkled the apple slices with cinnamon and did the banana chips straight up. We find (especially with this dehydrator) that we don't need to dip the fruit in anything prior to drying and I prefer that. The color change is nominal and the health levels with no additives are supreme.

For the dog treats, we slice sweet potatoes at around 1/4 inch thick and dry them to a pliable and leathery texture. Its a nice chew for dogs and our client's dogs love them. I got this quote from Modern Dog Magazine, which also speaks to making sweet potato treats, too. They say, "Sweet potatoes are a source of dietary fiber and contain vitamin B6, vitamin C, beta carotene and manganese. Most dogs love the chewy sweetness of a delicious dehydrated sweet potato treat. And you can rest easy knowing there's no additiives, preservatives or anything extraneous added." Click here to read their article.

I am looking forward to making fruit leather for the family and also yogurt leather per the instruction book that came with the dehydrator.

I love to dehydrate everything that would normally get wasted. Even left over tomato slices can be dried and stored to make tomato powder. We use tomato powder on pizza's, in soup, and canned dry meals.

What's your favorite thing to dehydrate?
Here's how to dehydrate apples.