By Linda Mahns Makes around 30 to 40 strips - depending on how large your eggplant is
Ingredients:
1 large eggplant, peeled
1/2 cup olive oil
3-4 teaspoons Umeboshi paste
1 teaspoon paprika
1/8 teaspoon cayenne
2 tablespoons agave nectar
Instructions: Peel the eggplant and cut into quarters length-wise. Thinly slice your eggplant, lengthwise and put on a cookie sheet, laying out flat. Take some salt and sprinkle on the eggplant to sweat the eggplant - this helps to soften it up a bit. It's not necessary but it's something I always do. Let the eggplant sweat for an hour or two and then rinse off the salt if you wish. Transfer eggplant to a big bowl. Put the remaining ingredients in the VitaMix and blend together. If you don't have umeboshi paste, you can experiment with a drop of liquid smoke and add a touch of apple cider or rice vinegar (not raw). Blend for just a few seconds and pour of the eggplant and stir to make sure it all gets marinated. Let it sit for another hour or so. Place on dehydrator sheets. Dehydrate for about 8 hours at 105 degrees and then turn over to dehydrate more if need be. The longer it dehydrates the crunchier it gets. You still might have to dab it down with paper towels just like you do with regular bacon. We ate a raw BLT last night and I also tore it into pieces and put on my salad. It's amazing how much it looks like regular bacon. The raw BLT was just putting some raw mayo on a piece of red leaf lettuce, adding some tomato and some raw bacon. We folded it up and ate it. It's pretty good!
