Page 1 of 3

Food dehydrator ideas please!

Posted: Fri Jan 05, 2018 12:51 am
by paradoxbox
Me and the girl just got a pretty decent food dehydrator/dryer at a clearance sale and I'm looking for ideas!

Anyone got recipes?

I'm thinking all kinds of jerkies, dried fruits, etc. but I am open to just about anything. Anyone else out there in kitchenland making dried foods?

Re: Food dehydrator ideas please!

Posted: Sat Jan 06, 2018 6:20 am
by Zasso Nouka
Wanted to have a go at food drying and once made a solar dryer but it didn't work out as it's too humid here in the summer to dry food properly I think in a solar dryer. It wouldn't dry food enough in a single day and food went mouldy overnight if left in the dryer.

Would love to hear how you get on as that may inspire me to buy and electric one.

Re: Food dehydrator ideas please!

Posted: Mon Jan 08, 2018 1:34 pm
by Eric in Japan
I would just check the clearance rack at the local supermarket before closing and dry whatever catches my fancy. No real new ideas though.

Re: Food dehydrator ideas please!

Posted: Wed Jan 10, 2018 2:46 pm
by paradoxbox
Are you supposed to soak vegetables in some kind of marinade before drying or just dry them as is?

Going to give tomatoes a try tonight, maybe oregano and basil flakes. But not sure if I'm supposed to add olive oil to the tomatoes first or just dry them as is.

Re: Food dehydrator ideas please!

Posted: Wed Jan 10, 2018 8:17 pm
by Zasso Nouka
According to the book I bought on solar dryers you can just dry them as is or pop them into a pot of boiling water for around 30 seconds if you want to remove the skins before drying.

Our plan was to part dry them and then put into olive oil so they remained 'chewy' rather than becoming hard and brittle but we never got that far cause they went mouldy in the dryer overnight.

I think for drying apples you can soak them in lemon juice to stop them going brown before drying but citric acid achieves the same result without giving them a lemony flavour.

Re: Food dehydrator ideas please!

Posted: Thu Jan 11, 2018 12:19 pm
by paradoxbox
Thanks! That is excellent practical advice esp. about the lemon juice, probably wouldn't have thought to do that.

Yesterday ended up making a huge meal so didn't have time to do the drying but this afternoon is a bit open so I will be cutting up a few racks of tomatoes and putting 'em in. Looking forward to some delicious pizzas and wraps. Dried tomatoes really are great and I rarely see them in the supermarkets.

Re: Food dehydrator ideas please!

Posted: Fri Jan 19, 2018 2:10 pm
by paradoxbox
I dried my tomatoes to hard little discs. It was a bit surprising to see how much bulk they lost, I bought 4 or 5 big packs of tomatoes but when dried they didn't even fill a plastic jam jar. Oh well! They are little explosions of flavor when you eat 'em. I think I might put them in oil like you suggested.

For now I have a silica gel packet inside the jar with 'em to prevent mold.

Pretty satisfied with this dehydrator purchase. Not bad for 3000yen.

Going to try making jerky over the weekend. maybe some beef and chicken.

Re: Food dehydrator ideas please!

Posted: Fri Jan 19, 2018 7:47 pm
by Zasso Nouka
Not sure how long they last once soaked in oil but it isn't forever, I've had them go mouldy in the UK when left for too long. Not a major problem I guess as you can keep making a steady supply with your dehydrator.

Maybe so of the varieties on this page Mauro's Tomato Collection might be interesting to try dehydrating if you have somewhere you can grow them this year. Mind you most of them aren't very resistant to blight so you need to either finish them before the rainy season or put them outside after and hope we don't get another wet summer or better yet grow them under cover. If not in a full vinyl house then under one of the tomato tunnels available from Komeri and other home centres. They have started breeding in resistance to leaf mould in some varieties but I personally haven't grown them outside so can't say how effective it is. The only tomato variety we've found to be resistant to blight outside is San Marzano 2.

Out of interest which dehydrator did you get.

Re: Food dehydrator ideas please!

Posted: Sat Jan 20, 2018 3:20 pm
by gonbechan
for dried tomatoes and how to keep them as long as possible.
Ideally vacuum pack them but if you cant, use a ziplock freezer bag and lay them out inside in a grid with wax cooking paper between layers.
This will help you remove just what you want without having to thaw the whole shebang.
Seal the ziplock up most of the way leaving enough space for just a drinking straw to poke through into the bag.
Suck out as much of the air as you can and then quickly remove the straw while sealing up the zip all the way.

Freeze this.
It will last up to a year ish (i have had 1.5 year old frozen ones and they were ok) if sealed properly.

When you want to put some in oil. remove enough for the jar and reseal the bag and put it back in the freezer.
Pop the frozen tomatoes into heated oil in a jar and when its cool enough, place it in the fridge for a day or so. You can add garlic and herbs to the ool too if you like.. or you can chop the tomato discs and add chopped garlic and basil to make a bruschetta
In oil, they don't last that long.. a few weeks tops. But in oil, they are so tasty that an opened jar will be gobbled up fairly quickly.

So making up a jar as you need it from the frozen will give you much more milage from your tomatoes.
Using a vacuum machine of course will extend that even more.

Re: Food dehydrator ideas please!

Posted: Thu Apr 25, 2019 4:51 am
by Gru
I've uploaded two Ebooks here (Google Drive), which are dealing with food drying. I have several hundreds gigabytes of them for nearly anything, so when you like to know something special, write me 8-)