It's the Pith!! Who Knew?!!!

During last week's process of a multitude of satsumas and lemons gathered from my neighbors' tree, I saved a couple gallon size bags of peels.  I forgot I had the satsuma peels in the fridge, which were supposed to be part of the attempt to make marmalade. Oy vey! 

Anywho!  I pulled all those peels outta the fridge Saturday morning.  I stacked the Meyer lemon peels and sliced them into thin strips .... very thin skinned, so they didn't have much pith at all.  Then I tackled the Satsuma peels.  They had a LOT of thick pith.  So, with my trusty serrated grapefruit spoon in hand, I set out to scrape the pith off.  Surprisingly easier than I thought.

After I took a retail therapy break (!), I stacked and sliced the peels into thin strips.  Onto the dehydrator it all went for an overnight spa treatment!  I think I ended up with 7 trays total! 

But wait!  That's not all!  While I was cleaning the kitchen I picked up the bowl full of the scraped pith to throw it in the trash.  I hesitated and paid a visit to Google.  I found out the most nutritious part of the orange is, second to the juicy Vitamin C .... guess!  The pith!  That bitter white webby stuff.  Who knew?  So, I thought .... hmmm, I thought.  I piled it onto the last dehydrator tray and stacked it with the rest of  'em.  I'll throw these into the food processor and make a fine powder to sit along with the blueberry powder and beet powder to put into smoothies!  Go Me, Go!  



Dehydrated Pith waiting its turn to be pulverized.

After 12 hours because I didn't get out of bed at 1am to check, everything was completely dried and went into the food processor in batches: lemon peel and Satsuma peel.  The pith will get its turn tomorrow.  Each of the other were processed into powders.  I ♥ my Cuisinart, but the coffee herb grinder was tougher and took on the job like a pro!  Now, I have citrus powder to use in those recipes that call for such and which I nevah, evah have on hand (and, don't forget smoothies!).  Yes!  I have that Stepford Wives grin on my face!!

So during all the dehydrating frenzy, I pulled several bags of frozen veggie pulp from the freezer.  Remember when I was juicing a couple of months ago?  I just knew there would be something I could do with this pulp eventually!  I thawed it and dehydrated it.  It's waiting to be pulverized into a fine flour for thickening soups or stews.  I've done the research!  This kind of stuff is expensive to purchase thru organic food sources.  I'd already been tossing it into beans and stews from the freezer ... with good results!  I also have fruit pulp in the freezer.  Imagine a fine powdery fruity flour that can be added to cake or muffin batter.  Oh!  The possibilities!

The assortment of dried peppers below look like

Christmas tree lights before grinding.
They are so beautiful, I may only grind on an as-needed basis!

 

And, YES! the marshmallows!  Yum!! 

A handful of these crunchy bits

is good for a sustained sugar buzz!

Gimme a holla (leave a comment)!