Leather Cookies!

No, not the rawhide variety.  Today had my first experiment adventure with making fruit leather.  I cheated a little ...bought a jar of all natural applesauce, no sugar added.  I know, I know ...much cheaper to buy the apples and make my own sauce.  But my time is limited and at $1.29 for the jar, I think I made a wise decision.  Until homesteading and prepping are my fulltime and only occupation, I have to make these choices sometimes. 

Instead of making one big sheet of leather, I made 'cookies' approximately three inches in diameter.  I used a tablespoon to dip the applesauce out of the jar, then spread it as evenly as possible with the back of the spoon.   This is the before picture.  I'll post an after picture this evening ...along with a taste test review.

They look a little uneven in thickness here, but the applesauce was cold from the refrigerator when I spooned it onto the tray.  The thicker parts will flatten a little as it warms up in the dehydrator, just as cookies flatten and spread in the oven.  The instructions in the book that came with my dehydrator said to aim for 1/8-inch thickness in the center and 1/4-inch thickness on the edges when making fruit leathers.  This is my first try, so we'll see how it turns out.  The 'cookie' in the top right corner has a bit of homemade plum jelly stirred in.  This is, after all, an experiment ...might as well try a couple variations!  They should be ready in 4-6 hours.  I set the timer for 5 hours and we'll see how they turn out. 

In the meantime,  Yeoldfurt and I have some saddle time planned for this morning.  We've learned from experience to prioritize carefully on our days off.  The first thing on the to-do list always gets accomplished ...the second thing usually gets accomplished.  Anything further down the list has a fifty-fifty chance of not happening for one reason or another.  Number One on the list today is some long overdue time in the saddle.  Number Two (not as much fun) is the never-ending chore of fence maintenance.  The leather cookies were just a wild hair I had while I was waiting for the sun to come up.  It took five minutes to set them up in the dehydrator and now they're on auto-pilot.  An easy bonus to whatever else we manage to accomplish today.