Drying Figs in the Microwave?

Each year I have about 70 kilos of figs from my tree. Fresh ripe figs don't have a long life, maybe a couple of days. I would be grateful if someone could tell me how to dry figs in a microwave. I don't have an oven and each time I have tried to sundry them, all the wildlife in the area think it's their birthday! I don't have the time to sit shotgun all day. Please help!

Sue from Cadiz Province, Spain

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Jess
Silver Post Medal for All Time! 267 Posts

March 11, 20080 found this helpful

I saw a great way to dry herbs and fruit on the show Good Eats with Alton Brown. He used a box fan and two furnace filters, held into place with bungie cords. I remember that it looked super easy and also was very fast. I have never tried it but it might fix your fig dilemma.

Jess

Denise

March 13, 20080 found this helpful

Don't know if it will work on fruit, but I bought a nifty little thing to use in the microwave here (in Japan) which you can use to make dried vegetable snacks. It is a flat tray of hard plastic which has bumps on it (to keep things from sticking) and holes in it, and has a bit of space under it so air circulation can go under as well as over what you are drying. It is about 1 cm tall and about 20 cm square and the holes are about 1 cm long and 3 mm wide, about 2 cm apart, in a grid pattern.

I think it works on the same theory as a cookie rack. You are supposed to microwave "french fry" cut raw potatos or hard yellow squash on high for 9 minutes on high, green beans for 7. I think you could probably duplicate the idea with anything that has holes in it so you get a bit of air circulation, but with fruit I would try it on medium rather than high. If it doesn't work, you will end up with a few cooked figs, which wouldn't be a waste, anyway.

Hope it works...
Cantate

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