Vegetable- and/or fruit-containing snack foods and manufacture thereof

A method of manufacturing a vegetable- and/or fruit-containing snack food comprising:

• (a) providing a mash comprising mashed potato that has been at least partly cooked, wherein the mashed potato has been produced using fresh potato, dehydrated potato or any combination thereof;
• (b) providing a plurality of pieces of at least one non-potato vegetable and/or fruit ingredient that is raw or has been at least partly cooked, wherein at least about 50% by number of the pieces have a minimum dimension of at least about 0.75 mm and a maximum dimension of up to about 7 mm;
• (c) mixing together the mash and the pieces of the at least one vegetable and/or fruit ingredient to form a dough mixture that has a moisture content of from about 60 to about 80 wt % based on the weight of the dough;
• (d) forming the dough mixture into a plurality of individual sheets having a thickness of from about 1 to about 8 mm;
• (e) microwave cooking each sheet to produce an intermediate cooked sheet that has a moisture content of from about 25 to about 45 wt % based on the weight of the intermediate cooked sheet;
• (f) cooking the intermediate cooked sheet in a hot air convection oven to produce a cooked snack food sheet that has a moisture content of from greater than about 5 to up to about 12 wt % based on the weight of the cooked snack food sheet;
• and
• (g) dehydrating the cooked snack food sheet to reduce the moisture content of the resultant cooked product to within the range of from about 0.5 to about 5 wt % based on the weight of the dehydrated cooked snack food sheet,
• wherein the dehydrated cooked snack food sheet comprises a rigid starch matrix and a plurality of individual pieces of vegetable and/or fruit randomly distributed throughout the matrix.