Get Your Kids to Eat Spinach

As with many things around here, this whole story started with a trip to Costco. Who can pass up a huge bag of organic baby spinach for $3.49? Not this girl, that’s for sure.

When I got it home though, I realized I had waaaay more spinach than I could hide incorporate into the week’s menu. What to do, what to do…why not dehydrate it? Then it would keep longer and could be added to lots of different recipes.

Here’s how to dehydrate spinach:

Wash the spinach thoroughly and shake/spin most of the water off. I used my salad spinner, but you can also lay the spinach out on a towel and blot gently.

Spread the spinach out on the dehydrator trays (I use this dehydrator). The leaves can overlap slightly, but don’t layer them on top of each other or they won’t dry well.

Turn the dehydrator to the “Vegetable” setting (135 degrees) and allow to dry for about 3 hours. When they’re done, they become dry and brittle like leaves in the fall.

I dried two batches of spinach and pulsed them in the food processor until they turned into a fine powder.

THIS is the genius part! Now I can sneakily add the spinach powder to:

• Scrambled eggs
• Spaghetti sauce
• Meatballs
• Fried rice
• Stuffing
• Cheeseburger egg rolls
• Soup or stew

I’ve even heard that some people add it to brownies…but I haven’t been brave enough to try that.

Note that you will lose some of the nutrients through dehdration, and the best way to eat spinach is fresh. But this will prevent the giant bag from going to waste, and your kids won’t disown you for serving it for 6 days straight!

Which of your recipes could use some dehydrated spinach?