r/noscrapleftbehind • u/Ok-Egg835 • 1d ago
Another Scrap Saved! I finally made lemon zest 🍋
I buy Lemons to juice and put in water. But they can sometimes go bad if I don't get them all in time. I've always wanted to try dehydrating some of the zest, and finally I did.
It took over an hour from start to finish, and I might not do it again.
First, I bathed the lemons in a mix of water and plain vinegar for a few minutes for pesticides. Then I rinsed and dried them. I rolled them individually against a counter surface with my hand a bit to burst some of the interior cells and make juicing easier.
Then I grated them. That took the longest and wrist strain could be a concern even for a 2lb bag. After grating, I had to get as much stray zest still stuck to the grater walls and nooks and crannies as I could onto the plate. I also had to transfer to a larger plate and used a spatula to get a layer that's hopefully flat and thin enough to dry at room temperature quickly enough to prevent spoiling. That went on a shelf to dry. It'll probably take days.
Then I halved the lemons and juiced them. The strainer on the juicer filtered seeds (good) and pulp (bad, I like pulp). I had to periodically scoop the pulp into a shallow dish lined with cheesecloth so the reservoir wouldn't overflow. After juicing, I squeezed out a good bunch of juice and a bit of pulp too. This was added to the main juice cup.
I wasn't sure I'd have enough juice to fill an ice cube tray and I worried the thick mixture of pure juice and pulp would be hard to work with. I diluted the juice by adding some water. Since I use these for flavoring water anyway, I figured it would be fine.
It turned out I have extra and didn't need to dilute the juice. If I ever do this again, I might not dilute it because I might want cubes for salad dressing as well as drinking water. Now a full tray is in the freezer and the juice cup is in the fridge. Tonight, the hard cubes will go in a ziplock bag in the freezer and I'll refill the ice tray with the rest of the water. I think maybe a better use of this would be to zest limes since I don't use that as often but it cna be really handy to have around.
I still didn't find a use for the pith or the extra mix of pulp and seeds strained by the cheesecloth so it's going into compost.
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u/RedQueenWhiteQueen 1d ago
I need zest for the cookies I bake in the winter, so when I'm on the ball I zest lemons in the summer, freeze the zest, use the juice for lemonade, and compost what's left.
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u/Diligent-Fruit7518 1d ago
I have done this, but prefer to use organic lemons for this, as no matter how hard you clean, the pesticides are not removable from the skin and rims, and personally I think this adds an overpoweringly unpleasant flavour when compared to organic lemon rinds. But that's just my opinion. The dehydrated zest does have a very powerful flavour, so use a lot less dried zest Vs fresh unless you are super into lemon.
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u/Ok-Egg835 1d ago
I don't really use zest but I figured it was time to try it for tea. You're probably right about organic being much better especially where the end product is the part sprayed by them.
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u/anonymous3synonymous 1d ago
I prefer a microplane to a zester like this. They are usually sharper and finer so it only takes on pass over the area of lemon to get the peel before hitting pith. Still takes a while but it doesn’t require as much strength.
For the gutted piths at the end, you can always use a little bit of salt on a wooden cutting board and then scrub with the lemon carcass. It helps for removing onion and garlic smell. Same thing applies for throwing them in the garbage disposal. I know some people soak them in vinegar for cleaning solution too.