Freeze-Dried Bananas

Although I intend on freeze-drying eggs again ASAP, I bought a bunch of bananas for something to freeze-dry in the meantime. I believe I purchased a total of about sixteen pounds of bananas since I really didn’t have any idea of how many I would need. I tried to ensure they weren’t too ripe:

I then lined my five trays with parchment paper, though I’m not sure if this was necessary (I’ve always done that when dehydrating):

After spending a lot longer slicing bananas than I expected, I laid them out flat because that seemed right, though I have seen someone stand them upright and pack quite a few more on their trays. Ultimately, I used about eleven pounds of bananas (including peels):

For the first banana or two, I tried to keep my slices the same width, but that wasn’t happening very easily, so I just did my best. Truth be told, I ended up with a wide variety of widths. Here’s a closer look from an angle:

All I really wanted to do was to keep slices smaller than the height of the tray lips, which after finishing slicing, wasn’t a problem. In fact, I probably could’ve sliced them significantly wider and ended up with more freeze-dried bananas, but I was worried they would take forever to freeze-dry because they were too thick.

Regardless, the bananas still needed a fully twenty-five and a half hours to finish freeze-drying, slightly longer than the eggs. This was surprising because I assumed the eggs would take a lot longer since they were basically water. Here’s what the bananas looked like after being freeze-dried:

Maybe I could say they appeared to have a bit less color, but they otherwise looked fine. I decided to try a few, especially the thicker ones, and found they were crunchy (and tasty) just as I’d hoped for, so I assumed the rest were fine. I packed them in Mylar:

I ended up with just over two pounds of freeze-dried bananas after starting with about eleven pounds (including peels).

One thing I noticed (and I didn’t take a picture of it) is that I had a hard time using the impulse sealer to close the Mylar bags because I stuffed the bags too full. I knew better, but I was dead-set on only using three bags to fit it all, even though I still ended up leaving some out (about 4.5 ounces) out for snacking.

I tried to seal the bag a second time, but I’m unsure whether it worked well or not because my bags don’t appear to have any trapped air inside (like the eggs did and other foods I’ve stored in the past). They also don’t clearly leak air when I push on them, so my decision remains in purgatory. I thought about repackaging them the next day, but I figured it was too late by then. I guess I’ll find out when I open them in the future. 🙂