Ugly Produce Is Still Delicious – Fairy Godmother For Carrots

by Texas Homesteader ~ 

Don’t Waste Food! Produce doesn’t have to be beautiful to be delicious. See how I play fairy godmother to some ugly carrots to make them beautiful again.

Don't Waste Food! Produce doesn't have to be beautiful to be delicious. See how I play fairy godmother to some ugly carrots. #TexasHomesteader

Grocery Store Produce Perfection

Have you ever noticed when you go into the store that there are rows & rows of identical produce, all perfectly shaped & sized.

But if you grow a garden or stroll through an actual farmer’s market you’ll realize that perfect produce is just a fairy tale. Real produce has much variation in sizes, shapes and colors.

Some produce isn’t as pretty, so the stores (and even some farmer’s market vendors) don’t like to sell it due to consumer-perceived imperfections. Such a sad waste!

But I’m here to tell you that the fairy tale has a happy ending when I play fairy godmother.

I take those ugly misshapen carrots and make them beautiful. And it’s not hard at all to do.

I like to dehydrate much of my fresh produce excess. So today I’ll be dehydrating some of these soon-to-be-beautiful carrots. 

Bibbidy-bobbidy-boo!

Ugly Produce Beautified

First I pull out those ugly carrots – some are way too large, some have several points grown into one carrot, some are twisted and shaped strangely.

I’ll peel them all then rinse them clean. Then I dice them up.

Although I’ve read that it’s ideal to cut them into roughly 1-centimeter chunks, I’m just haphazardly cutting them into small similarly-sized chunks and not paying too much attention to perfection. Hey, that’s just the way I roll!

I could use a mandolin for this slicing chore. But since RancherMan had a painful mandolin mishap several years ago it was banished from our Homestead kingdom.

No worries, a sharp knife completes this task quickly.

Chopping Ugly Carrots To Uniform Size. Don't Waste Food! Produce doesn't have to be beautiful to be delicious. See how I play fairy godmother to some ugly carrots. #TexasHomesteaderFirst Blanch Carrots To Be Dehydrated

After the carrots are all diced I blanch them for about 3 minutes. This will prepare them for dehydrating & make them quicker to cook when rehydrated.

A quick way to blanch my carrots is to use my vegetable steamer. This is my very lazy,  I mean efficient way to steam veggies for dehydration.

UPDATE: I know that raw carrots that are simply chopped & dehydrated lose their bright color and flavor in  storage. But I’ve found that to be also true with this steaming process. I’m now properly blanching my raw carrots in a pot of boiling water and they store much better. Read my findings in an updated carrot-preservation post.

Dehydrating Your Blanched Produce

Now I’ll layer the cut and blanched carrots on my dehydrator trays. It’s best to spread them all out where they don’t touch – but again, perfection is not the way I roll… 

I know as the veggies dehydrate they will shrink & won’t be touching anyway. So I just load up the dehydrator and spread them quickly, then turn the dehydrator on & walk away for awhile.

Dehydrating Carrots. Don't Waste Food! Produce doesn't have to be beautiful to be delicious. See how I play fairy godmother to some ugly carrots. #TexasHomesteader

I usually rotate the trays about once every 2-3 hours. But again, no schedule. (see above proclamation regarding my lack of perfection) 

Depending upon how evenly the carrots were sliced they will usually dehydrate in about 10-12 hours.

When my carrots are fully dehydrated I let them air dry for another day just to make sure there’s no moisture remaining.

Then I toss them into a glass jar, label the top & place them in my pantry for future use.

I like to use these bread yeast jars since they’re dark and I read that carrots lose some of their nutrition in light. It’s a perfect way to repurpose these perfect-sized jars!

Dehydrated Carrots. Don't Waste Food! Produce doesn't have to be beautiful to be delicious. See how I play fairy godmother to some ugly carrots. #TexasHomesteader

Dehydrated carrots will obviously last substantially longer than fresh carrots. And keeping them in my pantry takes no additional storage energy like storing fresh carrots in the refrigerator or prepared carrots in the freezer would.

Rehydrating these carrots is as easy as pouring boiling water over them and allowing them to sit for about 15 minutes.

Using Dehydrated Carrots

If I’m adding them to homemade soup I toss the dehydrated carrots into the soup pot as it simmers. They’ll rehydrate right there in the soup!

Or some of these dehydrated carrots are ground in my coffee grinder to make veggie granules. I can sprinkle them directly into my pot whether I’m cooking rice or pasta sauce to add a little more nutrition and a deeper flavor to those dishes.

Whew, this fairy godmother has performed well today so it’s time to take a coffee break.

There are oh so many uses for these now-beautiful carrots!

~TxH~

Other Dehydrating Posts

See All Our Dehydrating Posts

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32 thoughts on “Ugly Produce Is Still Delicious – Fairy Godmother For Carrots

  1. Donna Reidland

    I’ve never tried using a dehydrator, but it seems like it would be very convenient!

    Reply
  2. Janet Vinyard

    Hi Tammy, I haven’t tried dehydrating carrots before but I have some in the fridge right now that need to be used up so I’m going to give it a try. I like the idea of grinding them up and adding them to various dishes. I always add shredded carrots to meatloaf and potato soup. Thanks for the great tips and inspiration! Blessings, Janet

    Reply
  3. Deborah

    You are sprakin my language. Love this!!!!!!!!!! Thanks for linking up to #homemattersparty

    Reply
    1. Texas Homesteader Post author

      LOL Deborah. I want to remember that ugly carrots are beautiful too! 🙂 And hey, after they’re washed, peeled and chopped they look exactly the same as their symmetrically-perfect counterparts did. ~TxH~

      Reply
  4. Michelle

    I love the idea of using a vegetable steamer to blanch the veggies! I used to have one of those. I don’t know what happened to it. I may have to get another one.

    Reply
    1. Brenda

      I love this idea of dehydrated carrots ! Tell me more about the steamer please. ….brand..etc.
      Thanks

      Reply
      1. Texas Homesteader Post author

        It’s just a little steamer I received as a gift years ago. I like to use it when I’m steaming veggies from the garden for a quick healthy side but it comes in handy to blanch veggies before dehydrating too. I have one similar to this one –> http://amzn.to/2kPMTjM (affiliate link) ~TxH~

        Reply
  5. Michele Morin

    I’ve never tried preserving food with a dehydrator! Certainly something to consider!

    Reply
  6. Lisa/SyncopatedMama

    What a cute idea for a post – I love it! We love ugly produce around here – we’ve even lucked into it for free from our local stand because no one wants to buy the ugly stuff. Still tastes good to us!

    Reply
    1. Texas Homesteader Post author

      Sadly it’s what we’ve come to expect from our food, visual perfection. I’m not casting stones here, I’ve been as guilty as anyone else, picking through the produce to find the nicest one. I’ve found myself lately going for the ugly produce because I now realize that those imperfectly-shaped bell peppers or tomatoes are destined for the trash bin if they’re not sold and food waste is an issue that’s important to me… ~TxH~

      Reply
  7. Rachel @ Grow a Good Life

    Thanks for sharing at Green Thumb Thursday. Dehydrated carrots would be a very useful pantry staple to have on hand for winter soups.

    Reply
  8. Kathy

    This is a fantastic idea for your carrots! I do appreciate you sharing with Home and Garden Thursday,
    Kathy

    Reply
  9. Betty Taylor

    Those carrots look yummy! I love carrots and the dehydrated ones are delicious. Thanks for sharing this with us at the Four Seasons Blog Hop. Sharing this!!

    Reply
  10. Ashley

    Stopping by from nifty thrifty sunday. I avoided growing carrots in the past because our rocky soil, I was afraid they would turn out gnarly. I guess I should just get a dehydrator and not worry about it! Great post, happy easter!

    Reply
  11. Crystelle

    Sounds like your homemade soups will be delicious with those carrots….!! Pinning!! Happy Easter to you and yours…. 🙂
    “hugs” Crystelle

    Reply
  12. Sheree

    The oddities in the garden are always so much fun! I sell at the farmers market and it is always interesting how people perceive food these days. Many eye Heirloom varieties very suspeciously because they look different until you get them to taste them. Commercial growers have oddities too, they just wind up getting chopped up for frozen or processed in soup! Dehydrating is another great way to keep your produce available all year.

    Reply
    1. Texas Homesteader Post author

      Thanks for your comment Sheree. Consumers have come to expect perfectly-shaped produce and often nothing else will do – so funny, huh? Perfectly good food often gets wasted that way. I know commercial growers have their ways to preserve less-than-beautiful food to keep it from going to waste. Now if we can just get to the consumer & get them to think outside the box as well. LOL ~TxH~

      Reply
  13. Cynthia

    You sound like a great fairy godmother! I hate to waste things, even “ugly” vegetables. Thanks for linking to the In and Out of the Kitchen Link Party. Hope to see you next week.

    Reply
  14. Joyce @ It's Your Life

    I so need to get a dehydrator, I wonder if my carrots will look like some of those? Don’t matter I’ll eat them just the same, thanks for sharing weekly on Tuesdays With a Twist.

    Reply
  15. Kathy

    Good idea looking for the more misshaped carrots, in the end who cares what they originally looked like

    Reply
  16. janet pesaturo

    Thanks for sharing on Old Fashioned Friday. I am impressed by all of the dehydrating people are doing – I dry tomatoes, and sometimes apples and blueberries, but that’s about it. It really is a great way to preserve, and you are inspiring me to do more!

    Reply
  17. April

    Never thought of dehydrating veggies to make them last longer! Great idea!

    Reply
  18. Ellen

    I cannot believe my good fortune to read this post. Just this morning I brought out a box of our garden carrots that I had been “saving” in a rather cold closet which has an outside wall of our old farmhouse. I brought them to the kitchen, cleaned them off and thought that I might try dehydrating them. I do have a dehydrator that I have not used in years (how smart is that????) and now I am heading upstairs to pull it out and get these ugly little ducklings chopped and on to the dehydrator. Thank you again for the step by step and pictures – your site is beautiful!!! 🙂

    Reply
  19. Summers Acres

    All of our carrots from the garden are ugly twisted and misshapen, but they taste just as good (well actually better) than the long, pretty, straight ones from the store. We canned ours, but I may try dehydrating some next time.

    Reply
  20. Shawna

    This is so funny I did a post last spring called Attack of the Mutant Carrot and they looked like that. They were still good though. Thank you for joining us on our Four Seasons Blog Hop. Pinning Now.

    Reply
  21. Candy C.

    Isn’t it funny how once you grow your own food those oddly shaped or less than perfect veggies look beautiful too! 🙂

    Reply
  22. Julie

    I don’t have a dehydrator but I do love weird shaped veggies! Some of the shops here in the Uk will sell the odd shapes a bit cheaper and once they are cut up really who can tell!
    Out of interest my uncle had a nasty accident with a mandolin when he thought the bit that came with it to hold the veg and keep your fingers away from that very sharp blade ,was unnecessary. He ended up in A & E, bless!

    Reply
    1. Texas Homesteader Post author

      Julie – that’s the exact same circumstance with the mandolin that happened here with RancherMan as well. And yes you’re right, that bit that comes with it to hold the veggies when using the mandolin is absolutely necessary! ~TxH~

      Reply
  23. Marla

    I never thought about dehydrating carrots since I usually buy organic and use them up fairly fast, but this is a great idea. Thanks for sharing. Visiting from Tuesday with a Twist Link Up. Have a healthy wonderful day!

    Reply
    1. Texas Homesteader Post author

      Mine usually go pretty quick as well Marla, but when the garden is producing heavily I don’t one a single one to go to waste. My dehydrator has been a life saver this past year. ~TxH~

      Reply

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