# Drying cranberries in a dehydrator?

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/drying-cranberries-in-a-dehydrator/217621>\
**Category:** Factual Questions\
**Created:** [December 7, 2003, 9:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/drying-cranberries-in-a-dehydrator/217621 "2003-12-07T21:53:18Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 3\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![Badbug](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/6a8cbe/32.png) [@Badbug](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Badbug)\
**Post date:** [December 7, 2003, 9:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/drying-cranberries-in-a-dehydrator/217621/1 "2003-12-07T21:53:18Z")

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Just acquired a food dehydrator and have been experimenting. Pears, apples, bananas are fine. What I really want is dried cranberries. Being diabetic, I can’t use the store bought ones as they add sugar to them. Even the bulk store varieties. We put cranberries in and over 24hrs later they appear nearly as they did when we started. How do you get them to dry like the ones you can buy?

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**Author:** ![Church\_Key\_Kid](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/f9ae1b/32.png) [@Church\_Key\_Kid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Church_Key_Kid)\
**Post date:** [December 7, 2003, 11:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/drying-cranberries-in-a-dehydrator/217621/2 "2003-12-07T23:42:36Z")

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WAG: Since cranberries grow (I believe) underwater in bogs, perhaps they are waterproof. So, you would need to cut them or puncture them so that the water can get OUT.

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**Author:** ![Squink](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/b5e925/32.png) [@Squink](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Squink)\
**Post date:** [December 7, 2003, 11:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/drying-cranberries-in-a-dehydrator/217621/3 "2003-12-07T23:51:41Z")

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A quick google on [“drying cranberries”](http://www.google.com/search?as_q=&num=10&hl=en&ie=ISO-8859-1&btnG=Google+Search&as_epq=drying+cranberries&as_oq=&as_eq=&lr=&as_ft=i&as_filetype=&as_qdr=all&as_occt=any&as_dt=i&as_sitesearch=&safe=off) reveals that commercial cranberries are vacuum dryed in a microwave chamber. The home-dried product is “less desirable.” Several sites claim that the trick is to first rupture the skin by dunking the cranberries in boiling water for ~30 seconds. Just a WAG here, but you might do even better by freezing and thawing the berries before putting them in your dehydrator.