Dehydrating green onions probably isn’t the most interesting topic to talk about. Green onions are, however, an easy food to dehydrate. They can add some color and flavor to a dehydrated trail meal. Dehydrating green onions is also a great way to preserve an abundant garden harvest.
What do you need to do to prepare the green onions for dehydrating?
- Remove any mushy pieces (assuming they’ve gotten to that point if they were stored too long).
- Wash the green onions and remove any visible dirt.
- Trim off the tips and discard.
- Cut to size. Depending on your use, they can be cut in ½ to 1-inch pieces. Remember, they will shrink some when dehydrating so don’t go too small.
- Place cut green onion pieces on a dehydrator tray. Some dehydrators have an add-on screen that has smaller holes. Use that to prevent the green onions from falling through as they dehydrate. Alternatively, a fruit leather tray can be used too.
Pro tip: When cutting, leave about ½ to 1 inch of white that has visible roots left. Place that green onion nub in a shot glass with water to regrow the onion. When roots start to grow and green onion is about 2-3 inches tall, plant in soil to grow the green onion again.
How long will it take to dehydrate the green onions?
Dehydrate at a temperature of 130 to 135 degrees F. It will take about 4-5 hours to dehydrate the green part of the green onions. The white pieces of the green onions will take about 6-7 hours to dehydrate. The whites could be cut into smaller pieces or cut in half across the diameter to make the pieces smaller.
What else can affect the dehydration time?
- Size: larger pieces of green onions will take longer to dehydrate than smaller pieces. The green onion whites will take longer than the green parts to dehydrate.
- Spacing: crowding your green onions or stacking them limits the air flow.
- Humidity: the higher the humidity, the longer it will take for dehydrating green onions.
How do you know if they are dried enough?
Touch the dehydrating green onions see if they feel dried or still feel damp. You may want to take a green piece and a white piece of the onions out of the dehydrator and let them sit on the counter to cool for about 10 minutes. If the pieces still feel wet after cooling off, the green onions need to dehydrate longer.
How should you store the dehydrated green onions?
Dehydrated green onions should be stored in a cool, dry and dark area. They can take on moisture if stored in high humidity.
Dehydrated green onions should last for up to a year. As time goes on, they may oxidize and lose some of the bright color. You may not notice a flavor difference immediately. Eventually the oxidization will affect the flavor.
Dehydrated green onions by the numbers
3 green onions weighing 1.5 ounces before dehydrating were about ¾ cup after cutting. After dehydrating they weighed 0.05 ounces and were about ¼ cup.
What can you do with dehydrated green onions?
- Include them in light weight dehydrated meals for the trails, such as Buffalo Chicken Mac and Cheese
- Use them in custom seasoning blends or homemade salad dressings
- Add them to salads
- When a recipe calls for dried chives, use dehydrated green onions in their place
- Use them in recipes in place of fresh onions (but be sure there is liquid in the recipe to rehydrate them)