If you hike, camp, or do anything else outdoors, you probably know stinging nettles as an irritating, annoying menace. But did you know they can be a forager’s dream? It’s true! Stinging nettles, the exact same ones that give you a nasty rash when you bump into them, are a legitimate superfood packed with vitamins, minerals, antioxidants, and more.
They are awesome added to different recipes, steeped into tea, and even eaten as a side dish like you would spinach. Drying them for long-term preservation is easy and convenient, and in this article, I’ll tell you how to do it with your food dehydrator. I’ll walk you through below…
Harvest and Handle Nettles Properly and Safely
First things first, if you’re going to get your hands on stinging nettles, you’ve got to do the harvesting. To do that without getting stung, you should wear gloves; otherwise, you’ll need to be very careful that you don’t brush into the stems or leaves of the plant when snipping off the young, tender leaves.
Speaking of which, you only want to cut off the uppermost 5 or 6 leaves from the top of each plant, and only do that when the plant isn’t in bloom; once they have started to flower, large amounts of chemicals start building up in the plants that can be hard on your kidneys and urinary tract.
Plus, by harvesting only the uppermost parts of the plant, it will continue to grow and actually turn more bountiful over time so you can return again and again.
Will I Get Stung By Dried Nettles?
No! This is a common misconception. Nettles sting you through their abundant, fine hairs called trichomes, basically like little hypodermic needles full of histamines and other chemicals that will make you burn and itch.
While it is true that the hairs themselves don’t magically disappear when the leaves are dried, the chemicals they contain are deactivated and made harmless. Believe me, they are totally safe!
What You’ll Need
You don’t need much at all to properly dehydrate nettles yourself at home, assuming that you’ve already harvested them. If you have a food dehydrator, everything else you need is in your kitchen right now.
- Nettles: Only use nettles that are fresh, unblemished, and that you’re sure have not been sprayed with any pesticides, herbicides, or other questionable chemicals. If you don’t order them from a reliable supplier, you should only harvest from areas that you know are safe!
- Kitchen Shears or Sharp Scissors: These can be helpful for snipping leaves off of tougher stems, but you don’t have to have them.
- Thick Gloves: You do, though, need a good pair of thick gloves. I like to use rubberized cleaning gloves with wrist and forearm protection since they are basically impervious to those little stinging hairs and also waterproof. What you shouldn’t do is use thin exam or food prep gloves – they can be punctured!
- Sink or Large Mixing Bowl: Rinsing off your collected nettles is important to remove dirt, dust, bugs, and other contaminants. You can do this in the sink or a large mixing bowl at your preference.
- Water: For rinsing the nettles.
- Paper Towels or Kitchen Towels: Once washed, the produce should be thoroughly dried before going into the dehydrator. It sounds redundant, but it’s actually important to ensure even drying and reduce the likelihood of mold forming on any of the leaves. If that happens, it can ruin the whole batch in storage!
- Food Dehydrator: Any consumer-grade food dehydrator will do the job here. Familiarize yourself with how it works before you get to the instructions below.
- Airtight Glass Food Storage Jar: There are several ways to store dried nettles, but the very best method is in an airtight glass food storage container. Use a mason jar or something similar.
Okay, that’s it. In the next section, I will walk you through the actual prep and dehydration process.
Step-by-Step Instructions
Step 1: Sort collected nettles, discard bad ones. The very first thing you should do is put your gloves on. Then, whether you’ve collected the nettles yourself or ordered them, sort the good from bad. Don’t even try to dry any that are obviously damaged, discolored, sickly, or seem strange. Note that a vague purple tint is okay: young nettle leaves often have such a color.
Step 2: Wash leaves vigorously in cold water. Grab a few branches’ worth of leaves and wash them in a sink full of cold water, or use your bowl. Swish them back and forth vigorously to help dislodge any hiding insects and other contaminants.
Once this is done, remove the stems from the water and shake vigorously to remove the excess. Set them aside. Repeat this process until all of the nettles are washed.
Step 3: Dry leaves thoroughly between towels. Once the washing is done, grab a few branches and lay them out in a single layer on paper towels or a kitchen towel. Then lay another towel on top of them and press the water out as best you can. Keep the gloves on because you can still get stung at this point!
Repeat this process until all of the nettles are as dry as you can get them. Switch out the towels as needed once they become saturated.
Step 4: Pluck leaves, discard stems. Still wearing your gloves, use your fingers or scissors and snip the leaves from their stems. Set the leaves aside and throw the stems away.
Step 5: Turn on dehydrator, set to 110°F / 43ºC or “Herb” setting. Every food dehydrator is a little different. Some have precise temperature control, others have different settings for different foods. What’s important is that yours is set to a temperature between 95° and 115° Fahrenheit. 110°F is perfect, or just use the herb setting if yours has one.
Let the machine preheat for the prescribed amount of time if required. Consult your instruction manual for any questions.
Step 6: Lay leaves on trays in single layer. Lay the leaves on the machine’s trays in a single layer. Don’t let them overlap and don’t cram them in there. Leaving space around each leaf ensures quick and even drying, which is important for quality and also food safety.
Step 7: Dehydrate for 12+ hours. Once all of the trays are loaded, put them back in the dehydrator and close it. Set your timer and dehydrate the leaves for a minimum of 12 hours.
You’ll start checking on them around that time, but know that it can take several more hours for the leaves to fully dry out.
Step 8: Test leaf for doneness. After 12 hours, take a peek at their progress. If the leaves are curled up, completely dry, and shriveled, they are probably ready. Pull one out to test – when done, the leaves are totally fragile and crumble into small fragments. They won’t bend.
Once all of the leaves are totally dry, move on…
Step 9: Shut off heat, remove trays, allow to cool. Turn off the dehydrator, remove the racks, and set them aside to allow the leaves to cool. This is important because you don’t want to put warm leaves in a storage container; condensation can be disastrous at this point!
Step 10: Place dried nettles in glass jar. Once fully cool, you can place the dried nettle leaves in the jar. You can grind them beforehand if you want, but you don’t have to. Put your cap on tightly, make sure you have a good seal.
Step 11: Store and done! Keep your nettles someplace dark, cool, and dry. A temperature of around 50°F / 10ºC is perfect. You’ll also want to ensure that the location is protected from temperature swings and humidity.
Other Methods
If you don’t have a dehydrator but live in a reasonably hot and dry climate, or if you want to do this in the summer, one other thing you can do is air-dry them.
Many folks coohse to hang-dry them, but even something as basic as placing them on a rock in the sun can work:
Another way to do it would be to place them inside a paper bag, and give them a shake every once in a while:
Storage Life of Dried Stinging Nettles
Assuming all of the leaves are fully dried out and you keep them cool and in the dark, you should expect your stinging nettles to last at least a year with excellent quality.
If you should notice that they start to discolor or if they take on a musty, unpleasant odor, it is likely that they have gone bad and you should throw them out.
Rehydrating and Using Your Dried Nettles
It’s easy to bring dried stinging nettles back to life simply by soaking them in hot water. The trick here is to use just enough water to cover them so they plump up and come back to life a bit. If they don’t rehydrate fully, add just a little more water. Then you can use them as you would any other steamed or boiled green.
If adding them to soup, casserole and similar dishes with lots of moisture, you can toss them in as-is. If desired, you can instead grind them up into a powder while still dry and use them as a thickener or to fortify soups, stews, desserts, and more! You can also steep them to make a tasty tea.
Tim is a farm boy with vast experience on homesteads, and with survival and prepping. He lives a self-reliant lifestyle along with his aging mother in a quiet and very conservative little town in Ohio. He teaches folks about security, prepping and self-sufficiency not just through his witty writing, but also in person.
Find out more about Tim and the rest of the crew here.