I like to buy mushrooms when they are on sale and dehydrate them for soups, stews and other dishes. You can store dehydrated mushrooms for a couple of years. Make a mushroom powder from the dehydrated mushrooms for seasoning; dehydrated mushroom powder is called umami. Use mushroom powder as a flavoring in savory dishes, such as spaghetti sauce, soups, hamburger patties, or any kind of vegetable.
The first thing to do is to clean the mushrooms. Mushrooms are dirty when you buy them, so they must receive some cleaning beforehand. Before you dehydrate the mushrooms, do not rinse them in water because they will take a while longer to dry. Cleaning them with a damp paper towel is the best way. When using mushrooms immediately in your cooking, you can run water over them, but they will absorb some of that water. The cooking liquid will rehydrate the mushrooms. as they cook.
After cleaning the mushrooms, slice or quarter them.
Spread the sliced mushrooms on the rack of the dehydrator.
Set the dehydrator at 125 degrees for 8 hours. Turn it on and let it do its thing! When the mushrooms are dehydrated, they should shrink by at least half their original size. Dehydrated mushrooms should not be flexible; they should be crispy and break easily.
Store dehydrated mushrooms in an airtight glass jar or a sealed mylar bag in a cool, dark place for up to a year. Place an oxygen absorber in the jar with the mushrooms, especially if you live in a humid area.
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