What are you dehydrating?

Food, Nutrition and Agriculture
jennyjj01
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Joined: Sun Jun 04, 2017 11:09 pm

Re: What are you dehydrating?

Post by jennyjj01 »

GreyMan123 wrote: Tue Dec 14, 2021 8:05 pm Dehydration is not a method of preserving I had thought of?!
Anyone got an idea how much these cost to run?
I normally have a massive crop of pears, be good to try freeze some, bags full of frozen ones!!
Hi, Dehydration has it's place and I ADORE mine and use it lots. BUT. things never actually rehydrate the same again. So you could expect too much. They are all about preserving surplus produce without wasting freezer space, or indeed wasting any space at all.
What they do well is massively shrink and preserve veg that might get slung. Two kilo of carrots shrinks to a cupful of dried and pops into a jar, where it lasts years. Vac seal the jar and double the shelf life again! Never again sling half a pack of veg.

You have to think of dehydration almost like part of the cooking process in that you wouldn't expect cooked tomatoes to turn into fresh salad tomatoes. But they still make a damned good soup, or add texture to a jar of ALDI own brand bolognese.

Perfect for dehydrating are bread (for breadcrumbs), onions, garlic, mushrooms, tomatoes, peppers, sliced deli meats, and chillies. And then use them in sauces to completely enhance them. Or use them in your own home cooking.

Apples, oranges, pears, beetroots can be turned into fruit 'crisps' which are so very more-ish and replace sweets. They would last months if they didn't get instantly snarfed.

Or almost anything dehydrated can be powdered and used in soups, sauces or smoothies.

If you buy a dehydrator, try to get metal shelves.
Graceful Degradation! Prepping's objective summed up in two words. Turning Disaster into Mild Inconvenience by the power of fore-thought

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GreyMan123
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Joined: Mon Dec 13, 2021 9:57 pm

Re: What are you dehydrating?

Post by GreyMan123 »

Metal shelves…. Sounds good.
Any brands / models you would recommend?
pseudonym
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Re: What are you dehydrating?

Post by pseudonym »

GreyMan123 wrote: Wed Dec 15, 2021 6:39 pm Metal shelves…. Sounds good.
Any brands / models you would recommend?
All subjective to what you can afford. My Excalibur 9 tray cost a pretty penny but I was all in with dehydrating and vacuum packing.
Two is one and one is none, but three is even better.
ForgeCorvus
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Re: What are you dehydrating?

Post by ForgeCorvus »

pseudonym wrote: Wed Dec 15, 2021 6:53 pm
GreyMan123 wrote: Wed Dec 15, 2021 6:39 pm Metal shelves…. Sounds good.
Any brands / models you would recommend?
All subjective to what you can afford. My Excalibur 9 tray cost a pretty penny but I was all in with dehydrating and vacuum packing.
Or there are ones priced as low as £25/30 if you want to dip your toe in before taking the plunge.
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jennyjj01
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Joined: Sun Jun 04, 2017 11:09 pm

Re: What are you dehydrating?

Post by jennyjj01 »

GreyMan123 wrote: Wed Dec 15, 2021 6:39 pm Metal shelves…. Sounds good.
Any brands / models you would recommend?
Sous Vide 6 or 9 shelf. Cheaper than Excaliber
https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B07 ... UTF8&psc=1
Graceful Degradation! Prepping's objective summed up in two words. Turning Disaster into Mild Inconvenience by the power of fore-thought

Not Feeling Optimistic. Let me be wrong
GreyMan123
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Joined: Mon Dec 13, 2021 9:57 pm

Re: What are you dehydrating?

Post by GreyMan123 »

That looks brilliant
jennyjj01
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Re: What are you dehydrating?

Post by jennyjj01 »

Dehydrating two heavy carrier bags full of carrots, parsnips, swedes and having another go at dehydrating mashed spuds

Cost less than 2 quid. This is almost free food.

19p each from Aldi Super 6
3 x 19p for 2.5KG spuds
2 x 19p for 1KG carrots
2 x 19p for 500g parsnips
2 x 19p for 1 big swede
1 x 19p Red cabbage for pickling
https://www.aldi.co.uk/c/groceries/super-6

What's not to love at that price..... except the sprouts. You can keep them.
Tesco have reductions on veg, but not this good.
Graceful Degradation! Prepping's objective summed up in two words. Turning Disaster into Mild Inconvenience by the power of fore-thought

Not Feeling Optimistic. Let me be wrong
jansman
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Re: What are you dehydrating?

Post by jansman »

jennyjj01 wrote: Thu Dec 16, 2021 3:19 pm Dehydrating two heavy carrier bags full of carrots, parsnips, swedes and having another go at dehydrating mashed spuds

Cost less than 2 quid. This is almost free food.

19p each from Aldi Super 6
3 x 19p for 2.5KG spuds
2 x 19p for 1KG carrots
2 x 19p for 500g parsnips
2 x 19p for 1 big swede
1 x 19p Red cabbage for pickling
https://www.aldi.co.uk/c/groceries/super-6

What's not to love at that price..... except the sprouts. You can keep them.
Tesco have reductions on veg, but not this good.
It’s good for the purchaser,but how does the farmer make any money? I live in a farming community,and they all say , “ everyone needs a farmer three times a day”. Hey ho.
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jennyjj01
Posts: 3429
Joined: Sun Jun 04, 2017 11:09 pm

Re: What are you dehydrating?

Post by jennyjj01 »

jansman wrote: Thu Dec 16, 2021 4:59 pm
jennyjj01 wrote: Thu Dec 16, 2021 3:19 pm Dehydrating two heavy carrier bags full of carrots, parsnips, swedes and having another go at dehydrating mashed spuds

Cost less than 2 quid. This is almost free food.

19p each from Aldi Super 6
3 x 19p for 2.5KG spuds
2 x 19p for 1KG carrots
2 x 19p for 500g parsnips
2 x 19p for 1 big swede
1 x 19p Red cabbage for pickling
https://www.aldi.co.uk/c/groceries/super-6

What's not to love at that price..... except the sprouts. You can keep them.
Tesco have reductions on veg, but not this good.
It’s good for the purchaser,but how does the farmer make any money? I live in a farming community,and they all say , “ everyone needs a farmer three times a day”. Hey ho.
True. Nobody made money off me from that shopping trip. The entire basket was £3.30. I know nothing about the economics of farming.
You guilt tripped me. I'll donate something to the foodbank next time.
Graceful Degradation! Prepping's objective summed up in two words. Turning Disaster into Mild Inconvenience by the power of fore-thought

Not Feeling Optimistic. Let me be wrong
jennyjj01
Posts: 3429
Joined: Sun Jun 04, 2017 11:09 pm

Re: What are you dehydrating?

Post by jennyjj01 »

jennyjj01 wrote: Thu Dec 16, 2021 3:19 pm,,,having another go at dehydrating mashed spuds
Dang it! I cannot get the hang of dehydrating spuds!

Has anyone here successfully made their own instant dried mash by dehydrating their own spuds?
Please tell me the secret!

I've done a few experiments and try as I might, I cannot rehydrate to an acceptable mashed potato. not even close!

Watching various youtube vids, I tried two basic approaches: Blanch-dehydrate and fully cook-dehydrate. Neither was a success.

First try, fully cooked a saucepan of small cut potatoes, mashed them to smithereens into the residual water, spread that onto baking paper and dehydrated: Result was something like popadoms, which i tried to break up and pulverize with my food processor. They were as hard as nails, and i thought i would burn my food processor out. very difficult to powder, leaving pieces like hard broken cornflakes. Any flakes bigger than a grain of sand just would not rehydrate to softness. Discarded in annoyance.

Next, blanched some 3mm slices and some 15cm cubes briefly. Dehydrated overnight. Absolutely hard as bullets. I rehydrated some with an hour long soak and continued to cook them. Made something like mash, but this was no longer an instant product and the interim storage of the slices and dice just took too much space.

Third try tried shredding and blanching. Tedious. Because only blanched, these needed cooking on after lengthy rehydration.

And finally, like the first try, I made well crushed mash and dried it cooler and just for long enough to be crisp. This time it was not so rock hard and I ground it finely in a coffee grinder. I think the coffee grinder is an essential part of the process.. But again, rehydrating in some boiling water, I got a gritty, tapioca like mash.

All I want is smooth palatable instant mash. Surely it's possible? Can anyone share the secret?

* I was using Maris Piper spuds. Dehydrating to a powder fit over a kilogram of spuds into a cup
Graceful Degradation! Prepping's objective summed up in two words. Turning Disaster into Mild Inconvenience by the power of fore-thought

Not Feeling Optimistic. Let me be wrong