Adding sun dried tomatoes to your meals makes them much more nutritious because these little fruits are literally packed with vitamins and minerals.

Mineral-wise, sun dried tomatoes are high in potassium, giving you as much as 39% of the recommended daily intake of it (based on the average 2,000 calorie diet recommendations). This food is also reasonably high in magnesium.

As for the vitamins, sun dried tomatoes are full of them, which makes them a highly energizing antioxidant-rich food. They contain:

• B vitamins
• Vitamin A
• Vitamin C
• Vitamin E
• Vitamin K

Food To Live Organic Sun Dried Tomatoes also contain calcium, which is another element that’s difficult to get from diet alone.


Sun Dried Tomatoes: Calories

Sun dried tomatoes make a good dietary choice because they are both cholesterol-free and low on calories. As a cup of them contains only about 140 calories, you can include them into weight management meal plans.

Sun dried tomatoes nutrition benefits also include the fact that this food is rich in both protein and dietary fiber. A single cup f dried fruits contains 7 grams of fiber and 8 grams of protein, which is a reasonably high count and definitely explains why tomatoes are considered one of the healthiest foods.


Sun Dried Tomatoes Recipe: Lunch Salad

The best thing about this particular product is that you can easily benefit from the nutritional value of sun dried tomatoes because they are tasty and eating them is a pleasure. You can include them in a variety of healthy recipes. This salad is one of our favorites:

For this recipe, you’ll need to reconstitute your Food To Live Organic Sun Dried Tomatoes with oil. It’s a simple thing to do, just put some tomatoes in a jar and pour your preferred oil over them so that all pieces are covered. Refrigerate for 24 hours.

Salad ingredients:

• 4 ounces arugula
• ½ cup sun dried tomatoes
• 4 large olives (pitted and sliced in half)
• 1 ounce alfalfa sprouts
• 4-6 fresh cherry tomatoes (sliced in half)
• ½ avocado (diced)
• 1 egg (sliced, optional)

As it’s a simple salad, you just need to mix the ingredients together in a large bowl. Season it with the oil from tomatoes and add spices and/or salt to suit your personal tastes. This salad can be included into any diet.

One of the reasons why sun dried tomatoes are amazing is that you can do a great number of things with them. You don’t have to be a culinary genius to do this as they are a very simple ingredient to work with. However, remember that their taste is quite intense, so you’ll need to temper your use of spices based on this.

You should definitely try making some sun dried tomato pesto as it’s a healthy, delicious, and low-calorie kind of sauce. You can mix any ingredients you like, although this particular variety usually goes best with fresh basil, garlic, parsley, and pine nuts. Add a mix of balsamic vinegar and olive oil to thin out the sauce.

You can even add some red wine and fresh tomatoes to make it more juicy and flavorful.

How to Soften Sun Dried Tomatoes

However, if you want to use them in cooking, you’ll need to soften them out first. The easiest way to do this is to soak dried fruits in warm water for about 20 minutes. Keep them in a covered pan during this time.

If you are looking to enhance their flavor, soak them in wine, preferably red. This would make your sun dried tomatoes taste quite exotic and can make a huge difference for any recipe including them.

Do Sun Dried Tomatoes Expire?

Sun dried tomatoes are one of the products that has the ‘best by’ instead of ‘expiration’ date. This means that they don’t expire in the regular sense. If they are packed in oil, they might go rancid, like any oily product. However, plain dried pieces won’t spoil if you keep them in an airtight container.

It’s best to store them in a cool place, such as a fridge, but even a pantry would do. You can also freeze them. In this case, you’ll have to let them thaw before using.

Despite the fact that sun dried tomatoes don’t really expire, they lose their nutritional value over time as the vitamins and minerals begin to disintegrate. They should last for about 2 years.