Wednesday, December 12, 2012

Dave's Kitchen - Dried Cranberries

 
Dried Cranberries

To dehydrate cranberries they have to be cut or they will just cook and swell up before they dry. I had sliced each berry in half with a knife to fill the first 5 gallon bucket but I got smart and chopped them in a food processor for the second. The picture attached was with the berries ran through the food processor. It really sped up the process.
 
They can be used pretty much the same way as you would use fresh, just soak them in water first. To make cranberry sauce, just put them in a pot of boiling water with sugar and they will cook up great. They have a high pectin content and will form a thick sauce when they cool, just like a fruit jelly. They also make a good tea, just pour boiling water on some in a cup and let it sit for a while and drink hot or add ice and drink it cold - add some sugar if you like.
 
I add them to sweet potatoes when baking them with brown sugar(candied sweet potatoes), add them to the dish dry and they will soak up liquid as they cook. They also go good in pumpkin or sweet potato bread, add them dry and they cook up fine. If you add fresh berries to the batter they will be soft and mushy in the loaf but added dry they do well.
 
My daughter brought in 4 more bags of fresh cranberries yesterday that I haven't done anything with yet. I'm going to slice them and soak them in sugar before I dry them and see what they come out like. That may make a good snack item(if we're lucky), nothing like experimenting to learn something new, huh?

7 comments:

  1. I've only seen small bags of fresh cranberries at the local grocery stores. Do you have any ideas where I can buy them in larger quanties - and for a better price?

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    1. I've sent an email to Dave and asked him if he has sources for larger bags. He's in the south, and I'm in the North/Northwest. Up here where we are, I order from a food co-op called "Azure Standard", and I can get frozen cranberries in bulk 10-lb. packages. We're along one of their delivery routes from Oregon (they deliver in much of the west), but they also ship UPS. That might end up being pretty pricey. If you're anywhere in the pacific coast states, Idaho, Nevada, Utah, Wyoming, or Montana, you might want to check them out. Here's the link for their cranberries:
      http://www.azurestandard.com/shop/product/676/

      Right now they're $11 for 10 lbs., and I don't know how that compares to the grocery stores since I haven't bought cranberries from the grocery store in a few years.

      I found commercially dried cranberries here:
      http://amzn.to/UGbdBF
      They're $23.59 for a 4-lb. box. I googled the ratio of fresh to dried, pound for pound, and the websites I came up with said a pound of fresh makes about half a pound of dried. So this box would equal 8 pounds of fresh cranberries. That makes them almost $3 a pound for fresh berries. The only advantage here is that someone else has done the work of drying them. For those on frugal budgets, it's cheaper to buy them fresh/frozen and dry them yourself.

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  2. Thank you, Susan! I'm in PA so your co-op won't work for me, but I'm going to see if I can find one nearby.$11 for 10lbs is a great price. They're almost $2 lb. in my local grocery stores. Thank you again for your help :-)

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    1. I hope you find some for a good price. I heard back from Dave, and some of his advice might help you:

      "I dont know of anywhere to get bulk cranberries, the bags have gone down from 1 lb to 14 ounces this year also. Right now Walmart(in our area) have the bags for $1.50 and thats about as low as they usually get until after Christmas.

      When the stores try to unload them after the holidays they often go down to $.50 per bag. When they do, I go out and hit all the local stores and buy them out."

      That's copied from his email. If cranberries go that low here I'll be buying them up too! :)

      Susan

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  3. Thanks--me, too!!!

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  4. Hi Susan! I just finished reading your e-book, "Food Self-Sufficiency: Reality Check" and enjoyed it very much! Lots of good info there. I've also been browsing your blog and love what I read here, as well! Thanks for all of your work and for sharing it here! I hope to read soon how the cranberries turned out. Blessings from Bama!

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  5. Thanks! I'm glad you enjoyed the book, and that you're enjoying the blog. Dave is mailing me some of the dried cranberries, so I'll be able to give my own review of his results! :)

    Susan

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