What you need:
Three lemons (or any citrus fruit), sliced and dehydrated in the oven.
A serrated knife to slice the lemons
A rack and cookie sheet
1 cup sugar
A good blender
A mesh sifter
A bowl
Last month, I had too many lemons and limes and oranges in my refrigerator. I took three of them, cut them into slices that were about 1/8 inch wide, and placed them on a wire rack that sat on top of a cookie sheet. This allowed the air to circulate beneath the fruit, helping it to dry. The cookie sheet caught the small amount of juice that dropped out of the fruit.
I have a convection oven that cooks everything really fast, so it only took about two hours to dry the slices. I should've checked them a little sooner, because some of the edges were slightly burnt. It's probably a good idea to check the citrus slices every fifteen minutes after they spend an hour in the oven. You might discover that some of the thinner slices of fruit will dry faster than others. Once all of the slices are dry (if they're tacky, they probably need more drying time), the next step is to grind the dried slices in your blender.
I discovered that no matter how long I blended the sugar with the dried citrus slices, I couldn't get some of the rinds to blend into the mixture. This is probably a good thing, because the white part of the rinds can taste bitter. Solution: put the blended sugar/citrus mixture into a mesh sifter and use a spoon (or your fingers) to gently sift the lemony sugar from the small chunks of rind.
Your final product will be a pillowy soft sugar that's nicely flavored with lemon (or lime or orange or whatever citrus you decide to use).
This stuff is great sprinkled on strawberries. Use this to sweeten tea (hot or cold). Or lemonade, right? And I think this lemony sugar would be great way to sweeten pies, too.
Thanks for making stuff with me!
