Pumpkin is an incredibly nutritious vegetable, rich vitamins and trace elements. A variety of dishes that can be prepared from the pumpkin, can decorate both everyday and festive table.
If you do not want to part with a tasty and healthy product, even during the winter cold, you can prepare for the winter. One of the best ways to prepare for the winter is drying, a drying process that preserves all the taste and beneficial properties of the product.
About storing pumpkins at home and about how to save it in the cellar or basement, read on our website.
Composition and use
What is useful dried pumpkin? Pumpkin - natural vitamin and mineral complex. The fruit is considered to be the champion among other fruits by its content. gland. In addition to iron, the product includes:
- beta carotene;
- cellulose;
- vitamins - C, E, B1, B2, PP;
- macro- and microelements - potassium, calcium, copper, magnesium, cobalt, fluorine, silicon, zinc.
Daily consumption of pumpkin is recommended for people with various diseases of the heart and blood vessels. Increased content potassium helps to improve the functionality of the heart, strengthen the walls of blood vessels, as well as getting rid of puffiness.
Vitamin E and zinc saltsWith which pumpkin is especially rich, help to prevent premature aging of the body.
Pumpkin - product dietary. Due to the minimum content of coarse fiber and acids, it is permissible for vegetables to be consumed by people with inflammatory diseases of the digestive system organs.
A huge benefit pumpkin brings people with iron deficiency anemia, as it contains a mineral complex, which takes part in the process of blood formation. Regular consumption of dried pumpkin has a positive effect on liver.
Pumpkin itself is a product low calorie, and when it is dried, without adding sugar, the caloric content is 28 kcal / 100 g. However, if the pumpkin is dried, withstanding and blanching in sugarits caloric value increases to 110 kcal / 100 g.
How to freeze a pumpkin for the winter in the freezer, read our article.
Fundamental rules
How to cure pumpkin at home? All types of pumpkin are suitable for drying. To learn how and in what time it is necessary to remove the pumpkin from the garden, you can learn from our article. Before you start harvesting a vegetable, it need to prepare:
- Wash fresh pumpkin under running water.
- Peel off.
- Cut in half and remove the seeds (which can then be dried for human consumption).
- Grind into small cubes, 3-3.5 cm thick.
- Put the pumpkin crushed in this way into a wide container, pour sugar sand (per 1 kg of fresh pumpkin 0.2-0.25 kg of sugar), put on top oppression and put in dark cool place for 15 hours.
- After a specified time, drain the pumpkin juice (it is desirable to save the juice for cooking syrupwhich will be needed in the future) and re-pour sugar, placing the pumpkin in after that 12 hours in a cool place.
- From the resulting juice to cook syrup, adding to it another 100-150 grams of granulated sugar.
Boil and place the prepared pieces in the syrup at a temperature of 85-90 degrees, take 10-15 minutes and drain in a colander, letting drain excess liquid.
After the preparatory activities, the pumpkin can be wilted.
Ways
Usually, the drying process takes place outdoors or in an oven or electric dryer. How to dry a pumpkin for a decor and hand-made articles, you can learn from other our article.
On air
For drying on the air, the prepared pieces must be laid out on a sieve in a place with good ventilationwhere direct sunlight will not fall on them.
A few days later the pieces need to mix and leave for another 2 days. After that, you can make the sun, leaving a pumpkin in such conditions for 2 days. Usually drying by air lasts 5-7 days.
To learn how to dry a pumpkin right in your kitchen, you can find out from the video:
In the oven
The process of harvesting pumpkin is faster if produced in an oven. To do this, the prepared product is scattered on a baking sheet in 1 layer and placed in an oven, preheated up to 80-85 degrees for half an hour.
Next, the pumpkin must be cooled at room temperature and again sent to the oven, but in temperature conditions 65-70 degrees. Soak for 35-40 minutes, cool and repeat the procedure.
How to make a dried pumpkin in the oven sweet? On how to cook a pumpkin dried in the oven with sugar, you can learn from the video:
In the electric dryer
How to wriggle a pumpkin in an electric dryer? The drying process in the electric drier is practically no different from the drying in the oven.
Put the prepared pumpkin on the pallets and turn the device into maximum temperature mode.
After the pumpkin starts to dry out a little, reduce the temperature to 65 degrees and wilted to readiness.
Drying time and temperature conditions are different for each model of electric drier. It is better to read the instructions for electrical appliances.
On the methods of drying carrots, peppers, apples and pears, also read on our website.
Recipes
Dried pumpkin without sugar in the oven
The prepared and ground pumpkin is placed in the open air in the shadeby decomposing the sieve. Periodically procurement is necessary to stirso that the air acts on each piece.
Through 4-5 days dried slices should be placed in the oven and dried at a temperature 50-60 degrees with the door ajar for 20 minutes.
How to store?
Dried pumpkin, as well as other dried products, is stored at a temperature no more than 23 degrees in a room with relative humidity not exceeding 75%. Suitable for storage glass jars with pressure caps and paper bags. With proper storage, the shelf life of dried pumpkin is 24 months.
Dried pumpkin can be used as a standalone product, and for the fillings of various pies, to be an addition to cereals and soups.
A naturally sweet pumpkin will become good candy substitute for small children.
The amazing taste of dried pumpkin will remind you of sunny summer even in the most severe winter.
How to prepare a tasty dried pumpkin in the dryer for children? Recipe pumpkin candy and a banana in an electric dryer, you will learn from this video:
