"I bought a Harvest Right home freeze dryer." A saga.

I would but sadly anything large of value that doesn't fit in the house is stored in the garage and the most common thief here is under the age of 15 so small enough that it would be an easy task to wiggle in -.- A very good idea though. We've been fortunate, the last couple of days haven't been too hot so I've had the machine running almost constantly. It's been great!

It's been a little while since I've done an update so a quick one for funzies.
I've been freeze drying fresh herbs and storing it in jars because obviously storing them in bags would result in crushed product. Not a fan of that. But what I AM a fan of, is fresh mint for mojitos when mint isn't in season! Haha.




These herbs obviously won't last as long for storage, I'd hazard perhaps 2-3 years. They're stored in a dark place and that helps. But having some fresh herbs to sprinkle into food when you're looking for something that dehydrated herbs just don't hit for, they're super handy.

I do actually, I have a little hand-held pump that you sit on the top of the jar and it vacuum seals. Super handy little gadget! That being said, I've been considering getting an Avid Armor vacuum sealing chamber because then I could use a heap less O2 absorbers and have everything vacuum sealed more easily. It doesn't work great for jars, but if you're bulk vacuuming them you can actually do that in the FDer itself if you take out the shelves. It's an expense that I can't really justify just for now though, as the hand held vacuum does a great job on jars and O2 absorbers are getting the job done for now. 

Hubby went to Costco on Saturday and picked up a few kilos of frozen berries for me to freeze dry, so I currently have 1.5kg of raspberries and 750g of blackberries drying 😀. I also have a kilo and a half of blue berries to do, but I need to squash those first so they'll dry properly. I've seen a few tools that will prick multiple berries at once but to be honest that's way too much effort in my books. I don't care if they're pretty, I just care that they TASTE good. So likely I'll wait until they're partially defrosted, squash 'em to break the skin, and then put them through.

I did have to clean the machine out before I did the run because I'd done a double batch of garlic prior to running the load. So replaced the oil (which depressingly was still very clear and didn't need replacing however it STANK of garlic lol) and then did an alcohol wipe-down. Time to ask my MiL for a new batch of cleaning liquid as I've nearly used up the 94% alcohol that she gave me. I'm also going to buy some replacement tubing for the drain tube because it's difficult to clean and probably needs an alcohol soak as well. Leaving it off is possible, but I'd prefer to be able to just switch them out at cleaning time so that I always have a cleaned one ready to go.

I've got plenty of eggs FD'd, probably about 4 dozen at this point. Obviously that's not enough to live on indefinitely! But the basics like milk and eggs are a good thing to run through the machine when we don't have anything specific to process.

The thing I'm happy about is that we're now at the stage where we're considering micros when we FD something. Berries are full of fantastic micros so while they're pricy in general it's worth it to have a decent sized stash of berries. Crumbled on ice cream or other deserts they're downright astounding and give us some nutritional boost that will help if food fatigue starts to kick in. Freeze dried foods of all types are a great for storage obviously, but having something that's effectively had it's form changed and turned into a novelty is a benefit too.

I can't seem to keep in storage is FD'd pink lady apples. They're my favourite type of apples regardless, but when they're FD'd they're like an apple flavoured lolly that's GOOD for you! Win/win when you have kids. So despite how long they take to process to get them ready for FDing, I think I'm going to have to dedicate a solid week to building up our stocks of them again. I've also been asked by my sister to send her some bags of single ingredient items so that'll be something that I'll start doing in the next week or so as well. I'd been planning to do it earlier but it turns out that when it's pouring rain and the humidity is high, the pump puts out a LOT of water mist. I thought water had somehow gotten into the pump and sure enough it had. From the air lol. So when heaps of rain is inbound I just have to wait for a while so that I don't ruin the pump. I won't be able to use it much at all in the summer as it gets too hot in there so I need to continue making the most of the conditions while it's cool.

How’s the insulating the garage project going Stealth? My son is currently lining his big shed with r4 insulation batts and plywood to keep it cooler for food storage.

I'll be honest, it's been put on hold in the cooler weather. I did a bit of investigation on what the possible costs could be for insulating the garage and while we could do it, it'd be a LOT of money to spend on a house that we're not planning on staying in for more than two years. That being said I've been considering other options like building an additional storage locker style shed an just insulating THAT, because that's a lot less space to insulate and we do have a good space under the patio that we could put it under. The mind boggles at the opportunities!

Amusingly that's exactly where my first thought went to! It's a good idea, but I realised that it would be a little awkward to use regularly. But that led me to into a bike shed. I can get one for a few hundred dollars and then insulate the heck outta it, and that way it can live out under the patio in the shade and still be lockable so that no one can decide to abscond with it in the night. Good luck to 'em I say, they're bloody hefty units haha. The other advantage of course is that we can take it with us when we leave the property and the kids can just use it for their bikes, or we can use it as a smaller wood shed closer to the house where wood would be kept out of the rain. It'd definitely get use down the track.

So I've seen quite a bit of discourse about it, and there's one major thing in play I think.

As far as I can tell, American store bought freeze dried coffee isn't that common. From what I've gathered the more popular style is drip coffee from grounds and typically they're heavy on the robusta blend. The two main coffee strains that are used commercially are robusta and arabica (sorry if I'm telling people how to suck eggs lol) and from what I've seen a lot of standard American shelf grounds are at the minimum a blend of arabica and lots of robusta, but are just as often as not, full arabica. Robusta is far cheaper because it grows prolifically in more regions and has heavier cropping rates so it's good for commercial purposes, but it's also heavier on the fruity, acidic side of things rather than the chocolately, creamier balance that arabica typically has. It's exceptionally easy to get a bad cup of robusta coffee. It's more likely than not. Whereas you'll almost always get a minimum passable cup of arabica.

In Australia most coffees are either heavily arabica-based, or straight arabica, because our palates in coffee tend more towards that angle in general. Some robustas are actually quite nice in a blend but I would never EVER drink it as a straight robusta-only blend if I had the choice. Lots of waffle for that but it explains my thoughts on the topic so bare with me lol.

So, in Australia is it worth freeze drying your own coffee? In my opinion, not really. Almost all instant coffee is commercially freeze dried here, from either full arabica or low robusta/high arabica blends, and they're relatively cheap. I wouldn't freeze dry my own coffee personally because it would take a lot of effort to do it. Not only do you have to brew it properly which can take quite a long time to fill four trays if you're brewing it for best possible outcomes, but you'd also have to spend money freeze drying it as well.
Another issue is that when you rehydrate freeze dried coffee you're not going to get a product that's as good as fresh simply because you're 're-cooking' the product as it were. It's already been brewed, so adding hot water will reactivate the oils that have already been activated. You'd have to be very careful not to end up with what would taste like an over-extracted cup.
It's far less stress, effort and energy to simply buy a jar of Moccona or similar (the Coles fair trade version was pretty tasty when I tried it a while back!) and drink your slightly over-extracted tasting brew because to be honest it still tastes ok and does the job. It's not going to win any gold medals at barista competitions but it tastes alright and I won't stick my nose up at it if I need a cup!
I have several large jars of Moccona in my long term pantry even though I don't drink it on the daily anymore. 

So that's one aspect. I've seen a lot of Americans saying that they've gone out, bought beans and ground fresh to freeze dry and I think in the environment where freeze dried instant isn't readily available with better tasting beans that makes sense. You're not going to get a perfect cup from it, but very few people are looking for perfection when they're after a quick pick me up. Me included. But it makes sense when your other store-bought alternatives aren't instant freeze dried and that's what you want to stockpile because it lasts for aaaaaaages.

IMO, the only reason to freeze dry your own coffee in Australia is if you are a serious coffee snob, not just a part-time snob. At which point you're spending upwards of $100 a kilo for 'good' coffee beans, grinding it at home, and using something like pour-over or an espresso machine to make it yourself. Those kind of people turn it almost into the Western version of a Japanese tea ceremony and if that's what makes them happy then go for gold, I say! But if you're just an average, every day person looking to store coffee for long term in a pantry to have a daily brew or two, I wouldn't bother. Store bought versions aren't as good as fresh, obviously. But you're not expecting it to be. 

That being said for Americans? I'd say it would be worth it depending on where you are and what store bought offerings are available. If freeze dried is crazy expensive or difficult to get, doing it yourself for long term storage might be a really valid way to go. Fresh ground, fresh brewed coffee is always going to have the best results. Then freeze dried (depending on the bean blend), then air dried. 

And for reference I'm heartily convinced that if you handed most Aussies a tub of Folgers they'd probably ask you if you were ok. The only ones that would look at that and think 'yeah could be ok' are the ones that drink International Roast without a care in the world. Those people are mutants. Don't trust them. 🤣