This Spring, Make Your Own Dehydrated Onion Bread

Photo by Randazzo Blau

Spring is a wily season. It puts you in the mood for all of the delights of the summer garden but delivers none. Much of the pantry and root cellar are barren and farmers’ markets are still months away. It’s usually about this time that I hover like the Sorcerer’s Apprentice over the earliest greens still hibernating in my garden soil. I try and command them to emerge without much luck. Garden bounty, wherefore art thou?

Dehydrated Onion Bread, which is not bread at all, is garden goodness you can conjure up any season. Utilizing the tail end of the previous year’s harvest, I make enough to last all summer. The crisp, toast-like sheets soon become the base for a slab of Brandywine tomato, avocado and a schmear of mayo. Straight-up with butter works too. It’s a forgiving recipe with room for improv. Tossing in some extra seeds or a splash of soy sauce is always welcome.

Dehydrated Onion Bread

Ingredients:

  • 1 cup ground flax seeds
  • 1 cup water
  • 3 medium onions, thinly sliced
  • 2 large carrots, grated
  • 1 teaspoon Pink Himalayan or Celtic Sea Salt
  • 3 tablespoons extra- virgin olive oil

Directions:

  1. Mix all of the ingredients in a large bowl. Use your hands to squeeze the mixture together until a gluey dough is formed.
  2. Press a small amount (about the size of a lemon) onto a dehydrator tray into a flat, toast-sized shape. Repeat until all the mixture is used and about 3 trays are full.
  3. Set into the dehydrator at 105°F for 8 hours, then flip and dehydrate for another 8 hours. Alternatively, you can press onto a parchment-paper-lined baking sheet. Set your oven as low as it will go, crack the door an inch and check on it every few hours.