Tim Horton
Senior Member
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Post by Tim Horton on Sept 16, 2021 15:58:32 GMT 10
Dehydrating has been mentioned in some other threads.. In kind of a passing way it seems... So a dedicated dehydrating thread seems good... Every year we slice and dehydrate almost a ton or so of apples.. This for our meat rabbits.. With all the left overs going to the chickens.. The fruit in this part of the north is nice for critters, but not near good enough usually for canning and virtually none of table quality.. However we do get some fruit that makes good sauce, pie filling, chutney and the like.. Almost 30 years in the tool and die machine shop and I end up peeling, slicing, coring apples... Bugger..... I did a save as on this picture.. I rotated it and did another save as to make it correct in my computer... But it keeps inserting side ways... Anyone help with this ?? Do a PM for advise.. Thanks..  |
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malewithatail
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Location: Northern Rivers NSW
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Post by malewithatail on Sept 16, 2021 16:18:48 GMT 10
We also dehydrate a lot of food, 1 Kg of say carrots, dehydrates to less than 1/2 a small jam jar, and keeps for a long time, without refrigeration. Kale and other veggies also dehydrate well, as does blueberry's and most fruits.
We just cook the dehydrated veggies as normal, but when almost finished, let them sit for a few minutes to get the consistency right.
Our electricity is all off grid solar generated, so it costs nothing to run the dehydrators all day.
Fruit, especially pears and other sweet stuff, seems like lollies and its hard keeping the kids away from them ! Its a great way to get them to eat more fruit.
We have 2 Sunbeam 5 shelf electric dehydrators, and they were not expensive to purchase. One is several years old,the other only a few months.
I also have a solar food drier, and it works really well for fruit, they seem to be sweeter when solar dried vs the electric dehydrator. The solar drier tends to be a bit quicker, and that's probably why the fruit is nicer.
On Spike Milligan's headstone......I told you I was ill...
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dirtdiva
Senior Member
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Email: cannedquilter@gmail.com
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Post by dirtdiva on Sept 16, 2021 20:03:19 GMT 10
I am dehydrating tomatoes right now and also dehydrate lots of both herbs, vegetables and fruit throughout the year. I use a large older dehydrator and also use a solar dehydrator during the heat of the summer.
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Tim Horton
Senior Member
Posts: 1,945
Likes: 1,996
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Post by Tim Horton on Sept 17, 2021 15:48:58 GMT 10
Today we did a marathon session of apple drying and apple sauce canning... Made 48 pints of plain apple sauce... We tag teamed the process of cutting, cooking, juicing, canning the fruit that was good enough for this process... We also peel, core, slice 2 dehydrators full of apple rings for us to snack on.. Also did 2 dehydrators full of critter apple slices... Long, busy day..
Bad part is one of our 3 Cabela 10 tray dehydrators quit heating.. Fan runs, no heat.. Will have to take a look under the hood.. Bugger part is they are 3 maybe one is 4 years old.. Kind of disappointed if this is as long as they will run... But must admit, when we run them they run 24/7 for the duration of the season.. But you would expect that is what they are for... Luckily got them all for nothing as they all were bought with bonus money from the credit card..
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Post by Stealth on Sept 17, 2021 18:32:40 GMT 10
I actually need to buy a new dehydrator. I had one of those cheap sunbeam jobs for a couple of years, but it conked out a year or two back because I had it set up in the garage and it couldn't handle the load. I've been looking at the Excalibur ones because they seem to be pretty Gucci.
I'm also strongly considering a Harvest Right freeze dryer now that there's an Australian stockist. Australian consumer law gives a lot of protection to buyers so I'm hoping that dealing with a dealer rather than the producer themselves will result in better outcomes.
That being said I don't have a spare $10k to drop on that so it might be a while. Hence looking into a new dehydrator instead.
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