I bought a food dehydrator years ago. It’s pretty awesome, but it’s spent the last two years in the cabinet not seeing the light of day. The last thing I made was dehydrated blueberries and strawberries. My husband and I are smack in the middle of a Whole 30 cycle. I love it. I feel good about the food I am putting in to my body, and my body is thanking me for the food I am putting into it. One of the struggles with Whole 30 is finding foods at the store you can actually eat. Foods with added sugar, preservatives and other unnatural additives are a no-no. Many foods these days have added sugar. Instead of hunting for Whole 30 raisins, we pulled out the dehydrator and made our own!
The Grapes & Preparation
We used organic green, red and purple grapes, but use any combination you want. To prep the grapes, pull off the stems and place the grapes in a bowl. Bring a pot of water to boil, and blanch the grapes for 60 seconds. Then immediately drop the blanched grapes in a bowl of ice water to cool. Work in batches if you need to. Once all of the grapes are blanched, dry them and place them on the dehydrator plates. Follow your dehydrator instructions for temperature and time settings. We did ours at 135 degrees for 24 hours.
The Raisins
The red grapes became my favorite raisins (the ones on the left in the picture below)! They had just the right amount of sweetness, and were the perfect texture. The purple raisins (on the right) were huge and not as pungent tasting. The green raisins (in the middle) were the most tart of the bunch.
The two pounds of grapes yielded a much smaller amount of raisins than I was anticipating. It’s much cheaper to buy pre-made raisins at the store. That being said, the homemade raisins tasted great, and it was super fun to make them. I ended up using them in my Cashew Curry Chicken Salad the next day. You can get the recipe here. I would make these again, but probably as a treat or for an extra special recipe.
Homemade Raisins
Homemade raisins are a perfect paleo snack. They are also Whole30 compliant!
Ingredients
- 2 lb Grapes Red preferred
Instructions
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Remove grapes from stems, discarding any bruised or wilted fruit.
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Place the grapes in a dehydrator, and dehydrate for 24 hours on the recommended setting of the dehydrator.
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Check the grapes once or twice during the process to see how they are doing.
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Remove from dehydrator when done. Store in a air-tight container or Ziploc bag for up to one week. I keep mine in the fridge.
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