Do you prefer canning over dehyrating, or both?

[SCinPNW]

This summer I want to work on food preservation. I am planning on getting an Excalibur dehydrator so that I could start drying fruits and vegetables and then packing the dried items into mylar bags. But the more I think about it, I am thinking I should plan on canning certain items as well.

What do you do for food preservation? What items do you like to dehydrate verses can?

Thanks in advance for your input.

SC

[EX121]

A bit of both. My big preservation goal this year is some type of root cellar, so that I can store apples and garden vegs.
I did some dried cherries on the little dehydrator last year and it took a long, long time. I'd like to get an excalibur also.

[goatlady]

I much prefer canning most anything over drying as it's easier to just open a can of something, heat and a hot meal is ready in a few minutes. With dried foods one much have clean water available in goodly amounts to rehydrate the foods before they can be prepared for eating. When I am at the point of surviving after the S hits the fan I want a hot meal quickly with little energy spent in preps - may not always have clean water handy and several hours available to rehydrate something and then spend more time and energy cooking the stuff. Just my preferences at this point in my life. Anything I dry nowdays is designated for soup and stew meals.

[TyrannyUnleashed]

I do both as well. For me fruits have done real good in a dehydrator, and vegetables have been real fine for me by canning.

I have been dehydrating most of my fruits to make various trail mixes. Then I package them and will have plenty of power packed protein if I'm on the move. As far as storage for the trail mixes, I have stored them for short (freezer in a vacuum packed bag) to long term storage (Mylar bag).

As for Bell peppers, I really haven't found a real good way to preserve those. If I dehydrate them they shrivel up to nothing, and canning makes them somewhat less than appealing as well. Funny thing is that I like the banana peppers canned. Go figure.
Hot peepers are best dried and made into flakes or powder (this is only my preference only).

Tomatoes (I believe they are actually a fruit) can be preserved either way with decent results.

As I have learned if you dehydrate meats, be very careful. Using a dehydrator actually will cook the meat using heat. Just last week I saw an episode of Good Eats on the cooking channel where Alton Brown showed a good way to make jerky, using no heat. He had a few air filters (non-fiberglass type) and placed the lean meat in the slats and used the cool air of the fan to dry the meat into a jerky. I would assume the same method could be used for all types of dehydrating.

Here is a youtube video to the video mentioned above...

[SCinPNW]

A root cellar would be great, unfortunately it is not an option where we currently live.

Goatlady, you make a good point about canning over dehydrating. I will have to pull out my canning book and start a list of items I want to try.

Because I have read mixed reviews on dehyrating meats I was not planning on trying it at this point.

Thanks for the replies folks.
SC

[deijoe]

Need to get DW on board with dehydrating. She loves nuts, seeds, raisins and such.
What would a basic expandable system go for?

[sniper69]

Need to get DW on board with dehydrating. She loves nuts, seeds, raisins and such.
What would a basic expandable system go for?

Well an excalibur can vary in price depending on which one you get ($200 +). http://www.excaliburdehydrator.com/ Of course there are factory refurbished ones with a 10 year warranty for less http://www.excaliburdehydrator.com/3...gular-prod.htm