How To Dehydrate Food With A Dehydrator
If you learn to dehydrate food, you will save money by making your own snacks and storing some food that you may otherwise have thrown out. I freeze spinach and bananas when I can see I can’t use all of them before they go bad. But, here’s the deal, I can only freeze so many food items. Here comes the dehydrator. I have dehydrated many foods in my Excalibur Dehydrator. You can also dehydrate food on screens outside your home in the heat of the day with the food covered with nets. I have seen people put trays of food on their car dashboards to dehydrate food. I know some fancy stoves come with a dehydrator now. Wow, how times have changed.
I have been dehydrating food for as long as I can remember. I used to have a 24-inch square harvest gold dehydrator. Yep, it was a beauty! LOL! It worked hard for me for many years. Then Excalibur came out with one that had a timer and was a bit smaller. That timer is awesome, but you don’t have to spend the extra money to get that one unless you want to go to bed at night and leave the dehydrator going as I do. I call it set and forget.
The timer works great if you need to run some errands and only want to dry the food for say three hours. You set the temperature according to the food item and set the timer. Now, if you get home after running errands and you can see that the food needs a few more hours you can reset the timer.
I must tell you, I don’t store my home-dehydrated food for more than a year. I received my Master Canning and Preserving Certificate from the (USU) Utah State University Extension USDA classes right here in Southern Utah. I don’t use oxygen absorbers in my quart jars. I only dehydrate food for snacks.
I know people store their home-dehydrated food for the long term. I do not. I purchase commercially processed food storage for long-term use.
Tips You Can Use To Dehydrate Food:
- Buy fruits and vegetables in season, they’ll have the best flavor.
- Wash fruits and vegetables, slice or chop according to instructions included in your food dehydrator book.
- Cut away any bruising and discard food items if any mold is present, better safe than sorry. Stay well.
- The only meat I have dehydrated is hamburger, see the link below for hamburger jerky. You must purchase hamburger meat that is 93% lean ground beef to be safe. I make hamburger jerky. It’s hard to find lean ground beef, just giving you the heads up here, or at least where I live.
- If you keep your food dehydrator handy, you can dehydrate just about any fruit or vegetable at any time. It doesn’t have to be an Excalibur. My friend, Kim uses a Nesco and loves it! It’s smaller and sits on her kitchen counter.
- You can season the food with spices like cinnamon or dehydrate food in its natural state.
I’m sharing as many links today from my blog as possible so you can find all my dehydrated food information right here. You can just click on the words below and it will take you to that post. Enjoy!
Dehydrate Food:
I hope you try to dehydrate food this year, you will love the money you save by making your own snacks and building some additional food storage as well.
Copyright picture:
Strawberries: AdobeStock_76153511 by Diana Talium
I have been so lax in using my dehydrator. Need to get with the program. It is a wonderful way to treat my grandkids with home dehydrated fruits. I also like to cook veggies and dehydrate them to make an instant soup with bouillon. I camp a lot so it is a way to make sure I have nutritious food to take camping that won’t A) break the bank and B) take forever to cook.
I am going to test the waters soon by cooking pasta then dehydrate it to see if I can rehydrate with only boiling water and a bit of time.
Hi Leanne, I love dehydrating fruits for snacks. I’m not sure the pasta would work, just thinking out loud here. Keep me posted with your thoughts on cooking the pasta and then dehydrating it. I’m thinking it would still be hard. Let me know. Linda
I dehydrated a lot last year. Just recently I learned about how to make zucchini flour after you dehydrate it. I will do this this year as zucchini normally produces very well. First shred the zucchini, drain, dehydrate and then make it into flour by using a food processor. It will take 5-8 min,. When finished, tap the sides to get any flour down. Do not remove for 1-2 min or you will have flour all over your counter, cabinets and you! Store in jars with O2 absorbers. Can replace coconut flour and any recipes like that., See Google for recipes.
Hi Cheryl, I remember you telling me this about the zucchini flour, I LOVE it! This may help so many people with gluten issues, hopefully! Linda