Ever wish you could get more greens in your diet without eating salad after salad? Does the texture of cooked collard greens make you gag? Perhaps your children (or you!) don’t like the taste of super-greens. Or maybe your two-year old discerningly picks out any leaf-like object from her meals. (I’m not naming any names here.)
You regret your lack of green intake. You wish you were getting more in your diet. You know that they’re chock full of vitamins and fiber. If you need to feel guiltier about it, here’s an article proclaiming the health benefits of multiple leafy greens.
Good news! You can have guilt no more. My husband had the brilliant idea to dehydrate our greens this year. Dehydrating greens is simple, requires less prep work than freezing, and allows you to get in some concentrated nutrition without squirming over the color or texture of your usual greens. You can do it with any type of leafy green- even lettuce! Here’s how to do it. (This post contains some affiliate links.)
1) Wash & dry your greens. Wash under cool water, being sure to remove any bugs, dirt, or other goodies you may find if they came from your garden. (Of course, you can do this with store-bought greens as well.) Mary Bell recommends in her cookbook 
to remove fibrous stems and veins for the sake of re-hydration later, but we haven’t found this to be necessary for green powder. Pat dry with a towel.
2) Dehydrate. If you’ve got a dehydrator (we’ve got this one and love it), this will be easy. Lay out your greens on the trays in a single layer. Dehydrate at 125 til greens are quite dry and crisp. The time can vary greatly depending on the vegetable and your kitchen conditions, but it took ours around 8 hours, give or take.
if you don’t have a dehydrator, you can use your oven, though it requires a little more guesswork. Turn your oven on to the lowest temperature, place your greens on cookie sheets, and keep the door cracked open. (Make sure there are no kids around for this part.) You want the moisture to come out of the oven, not in! Rotate and check your greens every hour or so until they have reached the desired dryness.
3) Grind. Use your food processor or a clean coffee grinder to turn your dry greens into a powder. Alternatively, you could use a mortar and pestle.
4) Store. We keep our powder in a mason jar. Be sure to store your powder in a dry place to avoid spoilage from excess moisture.
And that’s it! You can add your green powder to just about anything- breads, smoothies, pasta, soup, casseroles, etc. Remember, a little goes a long way- try a spoonful at first and gradually work your way up.
Dehydration for the win!
