Dashboard Fruit Roll Ups

This morning, I got up and checked to see how hot it was going to be today.

No, it wasn't to see if it might be slightly cooler than the triple digit heat Baltimore has been experiencing the past few days.

I was checking to make sure it was going to be hot...hot enough for me to bake something in my car.

I've done the dashboard cookies and decided it's time to try something new and exciting.

It's time to make Fruit Roll Ups in my car.

FRUIT ROLL UPS.

Yes.

RAWRRRRRRR.

This is, like, one of the coolest days ever, because it worked.

IT WORKED!!!!!

Seriously, like, these things taste like the Fruit Roll Ups my mom would get my brothers and me as snacks when we were kids. I'd take mine completely out of the package, wrap it around my index finger, and gnaw away at that roll up on my finger. I have no idea why. It's just how I did it.

I did a little searching on the internet to see if anyone else had the same idea that I had and apparently there are more crazy people out there other than me.

Here are a couple of sites that I used for inspiration:

Planet Green
iPrepared
This Homemade Life

None of them talked about doing it in the car, but I figure if a dehydrator is around 150 degrees, my car is at least that or more when it's in full sun. I have baked cookies in my car before, so I know that it works.

I had some strawberries that were uber ripe, and I figured that was a good place to start. In a blender, I pureed

• 3 cups strawberries
• 3 Tbls honey
• 1 tsp lime juice

I made sure there were no lumps or bumps - the strawberries were completely pureed.

I lined a large, non-rimmed cookie sheet pan with parchment paper.

I set a fine mesh sieve in the middle of the sheet pan and poured the strawberry puree into the sieve to strain any seeds that didn't get pulverized.

I picked the sheet pan up and tilted it around to spread the puree verrrrrry thinly. Thin is the trick. If it's too thick, it will never dry in the car.

I grabbed a bath towel and trekked out to my car. I placed the bath towel over my passenger seat to protect the leather. Or pleather. I'm cheap-ish, so I'm sure my car has pleather.

I placed the cookie sheet on top of the towel, shut the door, blew a kiss to the cookie sheet, said a little prayer, and then waved to a neighbor who saw the whole exchange. It's OK. They're used to me doing things like this.

I did that around 11:30AM and I went out at 7:30PM. The edges were completely dry and fruit roll upee. The center was still fairly wet. I probably could have finished drying that part in the oven overnight, but in a house with only window AC units...not happening.

I cut around the non-dried parts, sampled too much just a few pieces and rolled up the rest in plastic wrap. Actually, we were out of plastic wrap, so I hacked some plastic baggies apart and made my own plastic wrap. Because that's just how I do.

So there you have it...the next car baking experiment.

What's next? Tomorrow I will be drying rosemary in my car.

RAWR.