How to Dehydrate Olives – Dehydrating Olives, A Step-by-Step Guide

Step 1. Process for Dehydrating Olives

First, drain and rinse the olives in water using a strainer or colander.  Consider water-soaking your olives for a few hours to remove some of the salt.  Dehydrated olives are also fairly salty

Cut whole pitted olives into 3 or 4 rounds. For olives that are already cut in half, just cut them in half again. We want smaller olive pieces for faster dehydration and, for later, faster hydration.

Step 2. Preparing the Dehydrator for Dehydrating Olives

For today’s dehydrator project, we are using the Nesco Clean-A-Screen removable mesh screen inserts for sticky fruits and small food items that we are dehydrating today.  They have over 2500 customer reviews with an average rating of 4.7 stars out of 5, which is evidence of a great product. Check out other Nesco food dehydrator products here.

These removable mesh screen inserts have a top and a bottom.  The bottom of the screen is smooth.  The top of the mesh strands has a pronounced point and feels rough as you rub your fingers across the mesh.  If you had a high-powered microscope, you might see the strands in mesh screens are triangle-shaped.

The Nesco 13.5-inch round dehydrator tray has close to 119 square inches or .8 square feet of surface area for drying.

Step 3. Dehydrating Olives

To save time, you can start dehydrating olives by setting the drying temperature to 160 °F (71 °C) for 2 hours. Then dial the temperature back to 135 °F (57 °C) until dry, approximately 6 to 10 hours, depending upon the ambient temperature and humidity and how crowded you fill your trays.

Step 4. When are the Dehydrated Olives Done

Start checking for doneness in 6 to 8 hours.  Fully dried olives will feel pliable while warm in the dehydrator.  It’s best to remove the tray from the food dehydrator or unplug the dehydrator and let them cool down a bit and then recheck. When dried, the olives should easily snap and break into smaller pieces.

Drying times will vary depending on your dehydrator. Refer to your dehydrator owner’s manual for recommended temperatures and times for dehydrating specific foods.

Step 5. Equalizing and Conditioning of the Dehydrated Olives

We always recommend letting food items cool completely after they have finished dehydrating and before packing them into a storage container. Warm food may cause sweating, which could provide enough moisture for mold to grow.

It does not take long for dehydrated food items to naturally start hydrating from the naturally occurring household humidity.  As such, this will increase the risk of mold growth.  Do not leave your dehydrated food items exposed longer than absolutely necessary.

After a short cooling period, pack the dehydrated olive rounds into clean, dry, insect-proof containers. We use pint-size mason jars to condition our dehydrated olives. Since the mason jars are clear, it’s easy to see what’s inside.

When the dehydrated olives are removed from the dehydrator, the remaining moisture may not be distributed equally among the olive rounds because of their size or their location and position in the dehydrator. Equalizing and conditioning is a process for freshly dehydrated foods that ensures any residual moisture remaining in any piece is spread or equalized among all the other pieces in the batch. Let the dehydrated olives equalize and condition in the storage container for 7 to 10 days. 

Every day, check the jar for moisture. Roll the jar contents around and note any clumping or sticking. If seen, put the contents back on the dehydrator for several more hours. Since canning jars are clear, it’s easy to see what’s inside.

If you notice any mold at all, even the smallest bit, throw it out. What you see are the mold spores finally blooming enough to make them visible. But there are more, even tinier mold spores in the rest of your jar that make your dehydrated food inedible. Toss it out and start another batch.

Step 6. Storing the Dehydrated Olives

Use an appropriately sized mason jar for storage; we’re using a pint-size jar since we have quite a few of them. The dehydrated olives might keep up to 2 months. Exactly how long depends upon your pantry storage condition. But you’ll likely go through them much faster.  In other words, don’t dehydrate olives for long-term storage.

We’ll use a food-safe desiccant packet for moisture control because we live in a fairly humid area.  For our pint-size mason jar, we’ll use a single food-safe 5-gram desiccant packet. We’ll be raiding the jar quite frequently and we want to keep the moisture under control.

Add the desiccant packet once the 7-to-10-day conditioning period is complete.

We use these inexpensive food-safe desiccant packets, which are available from Amazon. These 5-gram packets have over 5000 of mostly 4- and 5-star customer reviews, with an average of 4.7 stars out of 5.  Our bag of 60 desiccant packets will last quite a while because they can be recharged and reused multiple times. Other food-safe sizes are available.

Dehydrated food storage enemies include heat, light, moisture, oxygen, and insects or rodents.

I’ll also attach or include a short note describing the contents and the date the product was dehydrated.  The note also lets me know where to go in my dehydrator logbook if I want to make another note or two.