This is what Chef’s Table is all about…
Fresh tomatoes can be a bit hit and miss these days.
A lot of supermarket tomatoes are bred to travel well, hold their shape, and last longer on the shelf. That’s useful for transport, but somewhere along the way, flavour has often stopped being the priority.
So when Chef Ian found tomatoes at around $2 a kilo, they were a great buy — but not necessarily packed with deep tomato flavour.
That’s where chef thinking comes in.
Rather than using them as they were, Ian seasoned them generously and used the dehydrate function in the Ninja 11-in-1 to concentrate the flavour, remove excess moisture, and turn them into something far more useful.
The result?
Beautifully seasoned, semi-dried tomatoes with a soft, chewy texture — closer to a dried apricot than a crunchy tomato chip.
Before dehydrating, the tomatoes were seasoned with:
The idea here is simple: if the tomato itself is not bringing huge flavour, we build the flavour around it.
The herbs bring savoury Italian notes, the smoked salt adds depth, the pepper gives warmth, and the balsamic glaze adds sweetness, acidity, and richness.
Then the dehydration process concentrates everything.
Chef Ian cut the tomatoes approximately 2–3 cm thick.
This matters.
Too thin, and they curl up and dry out too quickly.
Too thick, and they take too long to dehydrate and may not dry evenly.
That 2–3 cm range gives you a good balance: enough body to hold texture, but not so much thickness that they stay too wet in the centre.
Place the seasoned tomato slices onto the dehydrating racks, leaving space between each piece so the air can move around them.
Set the Ninja 11-in-1 to Dehydrate mode at:
65°C for approximately 7 hours
The timing may vary slightly depending on the tomatoes, how juicy they are, and how thick they are sliced.
The goal is not to take them all the way to crisp and crunchy.
You are looking for a soft, chewy, semi-dried texture — still flexible, still with some body, and full of concentrated tomato flavour.
Chef Ian used the Ninja 11-in-1 on Dehydrate mode, which gives low, steady heat with good air circulation — exactly what you want for this style of semi-dried tomato.
If you have a separate food dehydrator, that will also work well. The timing may vary depending on the model, airflow, tomato thickness, and how juicy the tomatoes are, so use the texture as your guide rather than the clock.
You are looking for tomatoes that are soft, chewy, and concentrated in flavour — more like the texture of a dried apricot than a crisp chip.
You can also use an oven, but with a little caution. It needs to be set as low as possible, ideally around 60–70°C, and the door should be left slightly ajar if safe to do so. This allows moisture to escape rather than steaming the tomatoes. An oven may take longer and can dry unevenly, so check the tomatoes regularly and rotate the trays if needed.
The key is gentle heat, airflow, and patience.
Once cooled, store the dehydrated tomatoes in an airtight jar in the fridge.
You can leave them as they are, especially if you plan to add them into pasta sauces, casseroles, risottos, soups, or braised dishes.
You can also cover them with good olive oil and add extra flavourings such as garlic, herbs, or chilli if you want more of an antipasto-style jar.
Because these tomatoes have not been dried to a fully crunchy, shelf-stable stage, keeping them refrigerated is the safer option.
These dehydrated tomatoes are incredibly versatile.
Use them in:
Because they have not been dried rock-hard, they reconstitute quite quickly when added to a sauce or warm dish.
That makes them very practical for everyday cooking.
This is exactly the kind of kitchen thinking we love at Underground Chef.
You don’t always need expensive ingredients. Sometimes you just need to understand how to get the best out of what you have.
A cheap tomato might not be exciting on its own — but season it well, apply the right technique, and suddenly you have a flavour-packed ingredient ready to lift a dozen different dishes.
That’s the difference between just following a recipe and learning how to think like a chef.