ottawa foodies

I have always been a fan of an old dehydrator that my mother had and I acquired the thing fairly recently. I just took it out for a test drive last night and dried some organic carrots and some organic onions. I am planning on making a bit of a dried soup mix out of various things of that variety. I am looking foreward to this harvest season when I will be able to buy some economical and locally grown veggies to dry like this.

Do any of you folks have dehydrators? Any interestng suggestions of things to prepare this way?

My buddy is building one of those solar powered ones right now, and based on his results I may build one too.

How much carrots were you able to dry out in one whirl?

Oh yea, I make my own dried fruit, apple rings, banana chips, strawberries, blueberries and dried herbs. I like the fact that I dont have chemicals and palm oils added as the store bought ones ofteb do. Last season I chopped up my own soup mix and am still using it. Carrots, onions, celery,peas, greenbeans any thing else i found in the cooler made a good mix. I tried beetroot as well and it came out very well only thing I tried using it in a soup and it came out a strange grey colour ( the soup) so I added some tomato paste I had made the year before and it looked and tasted great.
I am using a Ronco dehydrator I bought on one of those infomercials in the 90's.

Zymurgist; I only used a third of the space for drying carrots and I used approximately 5 organic-sized (smaller) carrots for that. It filled a moderate sized bowl and was probably about a cup of carrots. I could tripple that easily with the capacity.

Dehydrating the onions left a rather distinctive aroma in my kitchen though, as the volitiles were released.

Cakelady, have you ever tried any of the leafy legumes? I'm curious if it would be possible to dry swiss chard or spinach. It would likely look like dried seeweed, but it could add some interesting flavours.

I just ordered 2 of the Costco dehydrators - shipped for $102 each. One for a buddy, one for me :-)

Zymurgist - if you build it and it works, I would love to see it and probably love to buy one.

The solar powered ones work well based on what I see on the 'net. There are lots of plans for them online and they seem easy to make. Though they take up more room than I'd like personally - and you need to put them in your back yard or somewhere with good southern exposure. So I'm not sure I'll have one personally. Some quick googling should bring up quite a bit - it did for me a week or so ago in any case

My Costco dehydrator just arrived - have not opened it yet.

I'm excited!

www.excaliburdehydrator.com
I have 2 of these. They rock if you do alot of dehydrating. For me and the mushroom season it is essential. I can dry 15square feet in one load which takes about 3 hours. Also perfect for fermenting things fast, like yogurt etc...
I made a good old solar dehydrator when I lived in the yukon that consisted of old coffee cans and 4 by 8 frames of fine chicken wire.(just stack them up and keep rotating every 6 hours) Set up some solar fans and booya... a solar dehydrator (I never looked at it like that though)I would dry around 80 lbs of morels a day using this system. Ill look for some pics....

At the restaurant, we use the dehydrator continuously all day and night. It works amazing to make paper/crackers/leathers. Lately I have been using it to make flavoured sugars, taking lemon rind, carrot pulp or even pickle, drying out and blitzing in spice grinder with sugar. I have done dried meringues, curd, mousse, anything with liquid I have tried to dehydrate. You can make nut crackers, boiling any nut in water until soft, puree and spread on acetate and dehydrate, no flour needed. It is easily my favorite piece of equipment we have. Never used it for beef jerky though.

So when doing carrots, how big/thick do you cut them? Slices? Or chunks? Or does it matter?

Oohhh, very nice Overlord. Love the ideas.

Zym, it depends on what you are aiming for doing with the carrots. I cut them into rounds as I was making soup mostly. If you want to make a carrot powder, that would likely be appropiate though using a peeler to remove strips of carrot and dry those might be nice. So long as it isn't so small it falls through the holes, it's great.

I am looking to start deydrating for personal use/health. One of my customers gave me some Kale 'chips' last week. I munched them down in utter amazement that something could taste this good and be good for you. The spices that were on them were like dill pickle chips - I have to find out what? Curry?, lemon? absolutely unbelievable - especially when I don't particularly like kale (I do now).
If anyone has a used one for sale or knows somebody, i would be interested. Thanx

I got mine at Costco online and it was by far the best price I could find on a quality unit. Make sure to get something with temp control.

p.s. I've had my Kill-A-Watt meter on it, and it looks like it consumes a mere 0.37 KwH per hour. Not much at all even given the 9 or 10 hours you typically have to run it!

re: the carrots - cut them into chips/medallions

Carrots were so yesterday :-)

Today I have some fruit leather made from raspberries, peaches and red peppers. Also some peach slices, red pepper slices, and some sliced, salted potatoes with hopes of making healthy potato chips :-)

Dehydrating peach slices, peach puree for fruit leather and halves of pitted cherries as we speak. I decided not to mix fruits and veggies this evening.

So how long will fruit leather store?

Mine is dried out really well. I'd like to be able to store it for a few months - maybe vacuum seal it in mason jars for that? I dunno. I just have it in tupperware right now

It should keep a very long time vacuumed. The stuff I make rarely last longer than a couple of months though.

while dried fruit will keep a long time beware keep it in a dark environment
they darken quickly unless you treat with citric acid
or meta bisulfite :S

I usually put lemon juice into the "batter". Good to know it will keep at least a few months - that is all I am interested in.

Now a question about those peaches.

I've done peach wedges and they take forever because the thick part of the wedge is so darned thick. I've also done pear slices which dry up really nicely because they are even.

How are you doing your peaches? I'd like to be able to slice them evenly but not quite sure how to do that because of the pit.

What I was mostly doing was cutting flat rings and if I couldn't make even slices, I would cut off the left-overs and put them in a bowl. Did that with 3-4 peaches and all of the "leftover" peach was blended and used for the fruit leather. It works out surprisingly well.

First to add some key words to make this thread easier to find next time : dehydrate dehyrated dehydrator

There.

Just threw together an ad-hoc chicken noodle soup with some of my home canned chicken broth ( Forum - Frugal Cooking - Chicken Broth! ), dehydrated onions and carrots, a sorry old piece of celery that was trapped in the fridge who knows how long, some salt and pepper, and a bit of my home made chili sauce ( Forum - home made chili sauce? )

Wow it is good - I'm pretty impressed with how well the carrots and onions reconstitute. They were the big purple onions, and the carrots I was raving about having gotten so cheaply ( Forum - preserving carrots ). The carrots in my soup taste like I just took them home from the market! Holy moly I can't believe it myself!

I'm going to go full boar next year with dehydrated carrots - I only did a bit this year because I was not sure how it would turn out.

My buddy in Nova Scotia started working on a home made Solar dehydrator last year and is finally getting ready to do some testing!



I'll report back once they get some sun in NS :-)

Home made onion powder!

Reminds me to make some of the classical dehydrated apples.

Just to connect the threads both ways

Forum - Drying Hot Peppers

I find that a dehydrator does rob the herb of valuable oils and begins to break down the cell walls, leaving the dry plant more vulnerable to spoilage. Air circulation is what is imporant. I lived in the Pacific Northwest for many years and dried all of my plant material in a dry place with plenty of air circulation and was always successful. Storing is as important as drying. I store my herbs in paper bags, in a cool, dry place that also has air circulation. Putting herbs in jars or plastic bags can promote any moisture that is present and leave the plants to mold.

Just ordered the Excalibur Dehydrator 3900B and I'm stoked! Should arrive by next Friday (Aug 24) latest which will still leave some time for harvesting from the garden. Can't wait to do a massive session and try beef jerky. This thing is going to going non-stop for the first week at least :) Anybody have the Excalibur? Got a good jerky recipe to share or some helpful hints? Definitely wondering about how to use the dehydrated veggies in regular cooking. Some websites are saying that dehydrated veg like corn takes at least 60 minutes to cook (seems a bit unrealistic for the average weekday meal). The other stuff - like dried fruit, kale chips, and jerky - is a no brainer. Nom nom!

Zym dehydrated a bunch of onions and they're great to add to soups, burgers, etc. They also powder easily if pulsed in the food processor. :)

Dehydrated carrots reconstitute well in soup and certainly do not take an hour. But if you use fresh local carrots to dehydrate, when the reconstitute it is amazing how fresh they are - just like they are right out of the garden

Fruit leather is also fun and easy - and you can put a fairly high vegetable (carrot) content and kids will still find it really yummy.

Here is my onion powder video



and carrots



The onion powder is fantastic for home made salad dressings since it also acts as a thickener too. I will do a video soon on that.

Thank Z.! Onion and garlic powder were tops on my list as well. I use a LOT of garlic powder but wanted to use more onion now that I've got the nack of basic bread making (still working on that one). Love the vids - the definitely reduce the 'fear factor' when trying something new. As for the fruit leathers - forget the kids - I want them for myself! lol... Just kidding. I have nephews so I'll make a pile to give to my sister/brother-in-law for them.

Fruit leather keeps forever too. I still have some about 3 years old and it is just like new. I packed it in mason jars and vacuumed the jars with the jar attachment to my food saver.

Good to know as I plan on filling up the dehydrator (9 tray) any time I use it to save on electricity costs. Shouldn't be a problem with the garden and that my family has a grocery store/cafe and I can grab any food that starting to turn before it goes off.

I have zero experience with getting the air out and vacuum packing. Was looking at the Food Saver but I can't afford it right now. The reviews were up and down. What's your opinion on the machines and models? Also, I travel a LOT which means that I'm always stuck when it comes to voltage/cycles/etc. Are there any manual options?

For the Excalibur itself I'll probably have to get a second back plate with the motor etc to attach onto the frame when the next big move comes. Still looking into that and whether or not a stabilizer etc will do the trick. Don't want to blow out the motor after a few runs so this will require some research.

Soooo excited! The excalibur arrived Tuesday and I've already tried it out on apples, bananas, and pineapples. Today, a dozen green bell peppers, 2 trays of shredded zucchini and 6 trays of orange and red cherry tomatoes. LOVE IT! :) What are you guys dehydrating?

Reviving this thread. Are you guys still using your dehydrators? I am thinking of getting the Costco one which is a square Nesco. My main interest is in making jerky as my husband loves the stuff and I find it is expensive to buy. As an example, we bought Sweet Sriracha Uncured Bacon Jerky at Trader Joe's last week and paid $5.49 (US) for 2 ounces. I figure with some experimentation I can make it for a whole lot less and the machine would pay for itself. My main fear with buying a dehydrator is that I will buy it, use it a couple of times and then have it just taking up space. So, I decided I'd ask the folks who have one if they still use it and if so, how much do you use it for? Many thanks.

You could always make Alton Brown's box fan rig. Significantly cheaper and at least you can use the fan afterwards.

www.foodnetwork.com

Canadian Tire dehydrator was recommended by a chef and it rocks. $30. I can get the name for you but it is the only one they sell I think.

I ended up getting a quiet plug in model for winter. It heat doesn't go to waste as it warms the house too, and it's quiet. Latest project was drying dates from Bulk Barn to make date sugar (when they get rock hard, grind them up in a coffee grinder, it's rated as the healthiest sugar hands down - it's just ground up dried dates). But . . . while you can make date sugar by drying dates in the oven overnight, it takes a long time to dry them in a dehydrator. I should have cut them in half first. After a few weeks, they are still not rock hard.