Food Dehydrators

I have a large Excalibur and a12 tray round one (harvest something) for the summer when I have lots to dry. I dry everything I grow because our freezers are usually full of meat coffee plus our strawberries , rhubarband peaches. that my husband need to bake pie (baking a perfect pie is his therapy).

This past summer I dried all the skins from the 100 pounds of tomatoes I canned and then ground them into powder. I use this all the time. It slightly thickens soup and stew without starch and gives everything a nice color.

I dried okra for the first time, it's slightly darker that fresh but looks and tastes the same. 5 pounds filled as one quart mason jar.

Six pounds of dried peas fit into a one quart mason jar! 

I dry chicken and ground beef in the over at 220. But I make jerky in the round dehydrator. Unlike store bought. home made jerks is low/no carb. Great when you miss chewing. 

If I end up with more than one jar of something I vacuumed seal it to keep it fresh longer.

My oven has a dehydrate setting, so I use that.  I make my own beef jerky.  Eye round roast + Alton Brown's recipe.  Yum.  

Alton Brown is my FAVORITE cooking GEEK!!!

Hubby and I just found a dehydrator a couple weeks ago half price at Academy Sports..waiting for tomorrow's appt to get cleared for the next stage of food so we can try it out.

We have a Nesco, but couldn't tell you the model. And it is fairly old- at least 10 years. We use it to make apple chips in the Fall. Tried the jerky thing once but didn't like the end result. Given apple chips is a thing the hubby has made for my now adult children since they were young and you can't buy them anywhere near as awesome as he makes it we are thus required to have a dehydrator in good working order each Fall. If this one dies it will be replaced. It was originally a gift so I couldn't even speak to how this one compares to other options, as I really have no clue. Not much help I know, but at least a little something. 

I keep seeing posts on a FB group with people swearing freeze drying is awesome. I am not sure if this is the same thing? 

I "inherited' an Excalibur dehydrator when my aunt moved to Florida. It's a simple model (one switch), but it's very effective. I mostly dehydrate mushrooms and celery for later use, and make jerky.  

I should probably also do strawberries. And garlic.  I've tried dehydrating bananas, but they just get messy.

Dehydrated Strawberries are YUMMAY!!!  What does dehydrated celery taste like?

I've only used the celery in soups. Sometimes I grind it, and other times it re-hydrates in the broth.  I never thought to snack on it to see how it tastes.  Wish I had some in the freezer, because now I'm curious.

I figured with all the newbies, I would give this a bump for potential new info.

Great thread!  Thanks for bumping it.  

If anyone has success making turkey jerky, please post!