Call it sun-dried tomatoes, oven-dried tomatoes, or dehydrated tomatoes - it's the same thing.
What would take 3-4 days under the sun for their water content to evaporate and dry out will take only 3-4 hours in the oven (the trade-off is smaller quantity). And since making one or the other in an oven required 4 hours of electricity, I just made the mango roll-ups and oven-dried tomatoes simultaneously.
Step 1. Use fresh mangoes, peel and dice and blend until smooth without using any water, strain to discard any lumps or threads, taste and adjust sweetness and mix well. Or just use your favorite store-bought mango puree (that's what I did). I used about 2 cups mango puree on one cookie sheet.
Step 2. Preheat the oven to 175F. Line a cookie sheet with parchment paper or a silpat is much better for smooth fruit roll-ups because the moisture from puree makes the parchment paper very crinkly.
Step 3. Spread a thin even layer of mango puree. Place it in oven for 3-4 hours. After 3 hours touch the puree to test if it is dried enough to lift easily and roll, or if it still has wet patches, continue to leave in oven until ready. The time in oven depends on how thin or thick your layer is. When the mango leather peels off the parchment easily, cut long strips using a knife or pizza wheel, roll while still warm. Done. Your healthy homemade mango fruit roll-ups are ready.
How light or dark your mango leather turns out depends on your mangoes and how many hours they take in the oven. If your mango fruit roll-ups taste chewy or firm on the day you made it, give it a day and they will turn soft.
If you have a lot of mangoes this season and want to store your mangoes for longer, making the fruit leathers is a good idea. Also, if you love mangoes but cannot carry mango puree while traveling - consider transforming them to these oven-dried mango rolls and take along. Store these mango fruit leather rolls at room temperature for a week or in the refrigerator for a month. You can eat them as is or serve these mango cigar rolls with mango ice cream!
Sun-dried Tomatoes / Oven-dried Tomatoes / Dehydrated Tomatoes
Step 1. Choose red, ripe, firm, and juicy tomatoes. Rinse well, dice or cut in quarters, or slice them up. There is no need to remove the seeds or peel them and all of that...you can if you want to.
Step 2. Spread tomatoes over parchment paper on a baking sheet. There is no need to space them out. Have your oven preheated at 175F.
Step 3. And if you are making the mango leather at the same time like I did, rotate the pans every hour. Your oven-dried tomatoes will be ready when you see them all dried up, wrinkly, and containing no moisture.
Q: Why to make sun-dried tomatoes or oven-dried tomatoes?
A: If you have too many tomatoes this season, you can either make tomato puree or tomato paste and freeze them for longer, or make these oven-dried tomatoes and store in olive oil and use in recipes. I don't get very good amount of sun on my patio to make sun-dried tomatoes, so if you live in places where the weather won't permit - making oven-dried tomatoes at home is a great idea and will not cost as much as store-bought ones do.
Q: How to use sun-dried tomatoes or oven-dried tomatoes?
A: The oven-dried tomatoes are packed with a lot of flavor. Add them to your pasta, on your homemade pizza, in your sandwiches, or to your salads!
There is no need to cook the mango puree or to boil it down for making the fruit roll-ups. There is no need to blanch the tomatoes in order to make sun-dried or oven-dried tomatoes. The procedure for making these two are very straightforward and need no proportions. Also, remember that you are not 'baking' them in the oven. You are just using the low temperature on your oven to dry out and dehydrate the mango and the tomatoes.
Enjoy.
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Aam papad. Looks yumm Nisha. A must try indeed.
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