Question on Food Dehydrators

[Monel]

I am thinking about buying a food dehydrator. I am looking at the ones from Excalibur.
If you were looking to buy today, what would you get?
Is not having a timer a big deal?

Please share your likes and dislikes for dehydrator models.

Thanks

[Monel]

Non of you uses a dehydrator?

[vick]

a timer is not a big deal.You can just check it from time to time until it is done.I use to make jerky and never used a timer.

[ssonb]

We use an Excalbur 9 tray. there are less expensive models but you need to make shure that what ever one you get that the blower and heating elements are not on the bottom. The bottom mounted models are very hard to clean and tend to short out.Vick is right the timer on our excal did not work when we bought it (they did send a replacement but I have never installed it) I only dry foodstufs when I am at home so I can keep an eye on it. I would rather not have something like that running at home with noone there, Just the firefighter in me I guess.

[Monel]

How long on average does it take to dry a load? Say, for jerky?
Also, is there any problem with over drying? Is that even possible?

[ssonb]

Drying time varies with the moisture content of the product and all dehydrators come with a instruction book but those just give you guidelines, jerkey has a lot to do with texture and feel. there is not really a problem with overdrying per se but with trying to dry at to high of a tempeture for the type of product. For example I ruined a hole batch of banannas that I had put in the dehydrator with the tempeture set to high thinking it would help to dry faster, Nope it just dried the outside in a crust and the interior was sealed and would not dry. A lot of drying times run anywhere from eight to twelve hours. Hope this helps some but this is a learned skill , so practize,practize. start with small batches and work up.

[Matt In Oklahoma]

Non of you uses a dehydrator?

I have a real old one thats dying so I didnt throw anything out there. One of the things I do on my jerky is smoke it first before drying it the rest of the way. It seems to have much better flavor that just dehydrating it.
ssonb and vick are steering you in the right direction for sure. I'm paying attention too because I will need another one soon.

[Monel]

I've seen where people dry frozen vegetables. This seems like a good idea as long as the shelf life is good. I have made jerky with my smoker and it does work well.

[ssonb]

We have dried a lot of frozen veggies, we wait untill Kroger or someone has them on sale and we use cupons. To dry frozen veggies dump them in a large plastic bowl one pacage at a time and shake stir seperate the ice crystals from the product as much as possible then spread out as evenly and flat as you can on a rack they can touch each other but no double layers, Oh BTW before you load up the dehydrator set it on a large thick towel under the bottom to catch the runoff there is a lot of water in the frozen stuff. We pack the dry veggies in quart mason jars and screw on a lid.

[Flagwaver]

dehydrated vegetables

ssonb, how long is the storage life once the dehydrated frozen veggies are put in the mason jars? Thanks.

[Monel]

For long term storage I am sure it would be better to use mylar bags and O2 absorbers. I am wondering how long this will store also.

[ssonb]

So fer it has been two years, we are still counting, but I do not see why you should not get close to the same storage life out of the dried veggies if you vac*** sealed separate servings then packed in a bucket compared to the long term cans
PS...A frendly question to mods. What this ***

[Klayton]

@ssonb look at where the *** look at the letters that it replaced, if you use just those letters, the filters sees it as a naughty naughty word and blocks it, so it thinks you are trying to sneak it inbetween other letters and blocks it...

if it frustrates you too much, just misspell it, like dokuments.... :)

[ssonb]

Well **** I'll just do that then LOL

[monkeybird]

I purchased an inexpensive Nesco model at Costco for $49.99. A purchased a second one from garage sale for $10.00. The second was an older model made by a company no longer in business. I dehydrated all summer. My inexpensive dehydrators worked fine. I never needed a timer. You must check your food frequently, so why do you need one.

All of my dehydrated food still looks great. I originally packed it in canning jars with the food processer. I wanted to watch for moisture. After 3 months, I put the food in a food saver bag and sealed. So far so good.

The only item I'm watching carefully is the store bought spaghetti sauce. It dehydrated beautifully, but I wonder about the oil content. Anyone have a shelf life on the sauce?