The harvest is over and winter nears. With every harvest season comes the decision of what to do with all the extra food. Since fruit and vegetables are perishable, most are ready and ripen at the same time. Many times, my family and I  just cannot eat all the food we grew or bought before it gets old or overripe. So we had to decide what we would do with the 'extra' before it goes bad.

For thousands of years, people have dried vegetables to put them up for leaner times. Preserving foods by drying is still quite useful. It's convenient, inexpensive and requires less storage space than traditional canning.