So you’ve freeze-dried your food or candy and removed all of the water from it. The next logical question one might ask is, how would you rehydrate the food? The process of rehydration essentially puts all of the water that was initially taken out of the food back into the food, restoring it to its original form and texture.
Some food preservation processes have somewhat complicated rehydration processes that require you to use high-temperature water for a certain length of time. The problem with that is that the people who are most likely to utilize and need to rehydrate freeze-dried food are people who are trying to lighten the mass of the supplies they have to carry. They can range from campers to long-distance hikers, to even astronauts. The thing is, rehydrating food at high temperatures requires fuel to heat your water for long periods of time, and sustain that heat. That’s why freeze-dried food is often seen as the best, as the rehydration process is relatively easy.
It’s best to start by stating that some foods don’t need to be rehydrated. You can eat freeze-dried candy, vegetables, and fruits in their freeze-dried state. Some people even prefer to eat things like freeze-dried gummy bears and other foods in their freeze-dried state, as it gives them an airy crisp texture. You can also crush vegetables into a powder, and sprinkle them into sauces. This will have the same nutritional value as adding the rehydrated vegetables, but will make your sauce smoother since there wouldn’t be any whole vegetables in it.
The rehydration process for all freeze-dried food is essentially the same. Place the food into a bowl with warm or hot water, and let the food reabsorb the water. This process should take no more than 30 minutes, Using hotter water allows the reabsorption process to happen faster, but anywhere from warm to hot water should do the trick. In some cases, like with leafy greens and some fruits, you can just spritz water onto them until they rehydrate, or put them into a plastic bag with a moist paper towel.
And there's no need to worry about over hydrating your food. It will only reabsorb what it needs, so there will likely be excess water in your bowl. Overall, it's a pretty easy and straightforward process, perfect for people on the go who want to lighten their load as much as possible.