How to Dehydrate Bananas to Make Chewy Banana Chips or Banana Jerky

Step 1

Peel the bananas

Step 2

If making banana chips, slice bananas in 1/4" slices. If making banana jerky, break the bananas in half then divide each half of banana into thirds.

Step 3

Dip banana slices (or sticks) in a lemon juice mixture or citric acid and water if you don't want them to turn brown (we don't care so I usually skip this step.) You can also put the the liquid in a spray bottle and spray them which works great if you're dehydrating a lot of bananas.

Step 4

Put them in the dehydrator until dried. In our dehydrator (at 135°F) it takes 8-12 hours to dehydrate bananas. Just check them every so often to get them to the texture you like. We like them when they're still a bit flexible and not crispy or hard. This the dehydrator I have; it works great, is reasonably priced, and doesn't take up a lot of storage space.

Step 5

Store dehydrated bananas in wide mouth quart size mason jars. If they are fully dehydrated they should store well for several months. If you want to store them for longer than a few months, I would suggest putting an oxygen absorber in the jar or storing the jar of dehydrated bananas in the freezer.

Step 6

To reconstitute dehydrated bananas put one part bananas to one part water in a sauce pan and simmer for 5 minutes - obviously,they won't be exactly like fresh bananas but they're pretty close.