Re-hydrating

General Rules:

If the food was freeze dried in raw form, use cold water to re-hydrate
If the food was freeze dried in blanched or cooked form, use hot water to re-hydrate

And you might want to try your food in it’s freeze dried state. Most fruits and many vegetables are excellent as snacks just as they are!

RE-HYDRATING:

If you want to return your food to the state it was in before freeze drying, you’ll need to add moisture. You can use any liquid, but plain water is most common. How do you know how much water to use?

Soup: This is the easiest way to re-hydrate- just put the freeze dried ingredients into a pot of recently boiled (still steaming) water. Once the food is re-hydrated, you can continue cooking just as you would if the ingredients were fresh. Or you can put all the cooked, freeze dried soup ingredients in a bowl and pour very hot water over them. Stir then cover to keep warm for 3-5 min so everything can re-hydrate. Single serving soup in just minutes!

Cooked/Blanched foods: You won’t need a set amount of liquid if the food was cooked or blanched. Many freeze dried foods do just fine with the pour over method.

• Determine how much food you want to re-hydrate and put it in a bowl. The volume of the food doesn’t really change when freeze dried or re-hydrated, so it’s easy to select the volume you would use as if it were already re-hydrated.
• Pour freshly boiled (still steaming) water over the food in the bowl. You can do this a little at a time so you can see how much is needed to re-hydrate the food without it being soup.
• Stir to ensure all bits get wet
• Cover the bowl to hold in the heat and steam
• Let it sit for a few minutes to soak up all the liquid
• If it needs more liquid, you can add it. If the texture is right but there are a few dry spots, just stir well.
• Enjoy the food!
  
  **Another option for cooked/blanched food is to put it in a steamer basket and let it steam until fully re-hydrated.

Raw foods: Any food that hasn’t been cooked/blanched and that isn’t delicate (like herbs) and won’t be harmed by too much water (like bread or tortillas) can be soaked in cold water. Raw foods take significantly longer to re-hydrate. Unlike cooked/blanched that only take minutes, raw foods can take between 2 – 48 hours to re-hydrate. And you can leave most foods in the liquid for up to 48 hours before you drain/cook it.

• Put the food in a bowl and cover completely with cold water- For fruit or other juicy food, only put just enough water to cover the food so you don’t lose favor/juice in excess water.
• Stir the food to ensure all surfaces are wet.
• Cover the bowl and put it in the fridge.
• Check once an hour or so to see if it is a food that will only take a couple hours or if it will take several.
• Drain in a colander or remove food with a slotted spoon
• Cook as desired

Adding cooked/blanched freeze dried items to batters and mixes: Maybe you want to add some freeze dried fruit to a muffin mix or freeze dried shredded zucchini to a bread mix.

For runny batter (like muffins):

• Mix up the batter according to the recipe
• Add the freeze dried ingredient in the desired amount (same amount that you would add if it was fresh)
• Mix it into the batter so all pieces are coated.
• Let the mix sit for 2-3 minutes (5 min. max) to re hydrate before you bake the mix. If you don’t give it time to re-hydrate before you put it in the oven, the added bits might float to the top while baking and could burn.
• Bake according to the recipe

For thick batters/mixes: (like bread, and especially with a lot of dried ingredients, like a cobbler)

Since the dried food will absorb a good bit of liquid, you might need to either re-hydrate the food before it is added, or use/add a bit of extra liquid to bring the batter/mix back to the correct consistency.

For delicate foods/items: For things you want to keep in great shape visually (berries/fruits used as a garnish) or delicate items (like herbs) you can spray/mist them.

• Fill a food grade spray bottle with cold water
• Gently spread the food on a plate or tray
• Lightly mist the food being careful not to spray it off the plate/tray
• Let sit for a few seconds
• Turn the food over and gently spritz again
• Let sit for a few minutes. It should re-hydrate beautifully. Herbs will once again be flexible and aromatic.

Bread/Tortillas: These need very little moisture to re-hydrate. For a few pieces, wrap each in a damp paper towel, put them in a baggie you can seal, and place in the fridge for about 20 min. You can check part way through to see if you need to add more water.

For larger batches, wrap the whole stack in damp paper towels, put inside a baggie you can seal, and leave in the fridge for a few hours. Check occasionally to see if you need to add more moisture or if you can remove the paper towels.