Talk To Me About Dehydrating

[jishinsjourney]

So I have a dehydrator — a Nesco, one of those square ones with the big hole in the center. It’s okay, does the job, generally takes longer than recommended.

I haven’t upgraded to a better one yet, because aside from herbs, a dried mirepoix mix (carrots, celery, parsley, onion flakes), dried mushrooms, dried tomatoes, and dried cherries, I haven’t felt confident stocking up my pantry with dried foods. Mostly, this is because I don’t know what to do with them outside of soup and stew.

What do you all like to make with your dehydrated foods? Since I’m cooking for a diabetic, I try not to stock up on a ton of dried fruit, but a little is okay. Mostly I’m looking for savory ideas.

The thought of hot water rehydration and soup right now is unappetizing because it’s still summer here, so there’s extra bonus gratitude on my part for things that are more like fork-and-knife entrees or sides.

Or do you just usually use dehydrated foods during the colder months? Inquiring minds want to know.

 

[d_marsh]

I tried the dehydrating thing for a while, mostly making vegetable packs that I would vacuum seal. My plan was to add them to my food stores to throw in soups or stews to add calories, vitamins and flavor. I did make a few soup mixes with dehydrated chicken and veggies but that was about it.

 

[snappy1]

I make scalloped potatoes from dehydrated potato slices. That was good! I like dehydrated mini marshmallows as a snack.

 

[LadyLocust]

@jishinsjourney
I really like my little nesco for greens. I dehydrate kale and chard then crumble it into all sorts of dishes to help us get more greens- yes especially in winter.
Also on the diabetic front: you can make jerky. Either meat strips or hamburger type. What you make can be so much healthier than what is offered in the stores.
Most of the veggies, I do use for things like soups or stews. It takes far less room, is lighter and shelf stable vs other methods. (Think power outages).
I do love my dried apricots .
If I think of more, I will share.
There is a dehydrating thread- might have to scroll through and see what folks are drying.

Also - know she’s busy today but will call on @Amish Heart She does quite a bit also.

 

[Pearl]

@jishinsjourney
I really like my little nesco for greens. I dehydrate kale and chard then crumble it into all sorts of dishes to help us get more greens- yes especially in winter.
Also on the diabetic front: you can make jerky. Either meat strips or hamburger type. What you make can be so much healthier than what is offered in the stores.
Most of the veggies, I do use for things like soups or stews. It takes far less room, is lighter and shelf stable vs other methods. (Think power outages).
I do love my dried apricots .
If I think of more, I will share.
There is a dehydrating thread- might have to scroll through and see what folks are drying.

Also - know she’s busy today but will call on @Amish Heart She does quite a bit also.

Yes, wait for Amish!

 

[Amish Heart]

I have two excalibur dehydrators I use a lot. If you're looking for savory ideas, look at some of the "meals in a jar" recipes on line, there's so many of them. I have alot of those stored, plus just dehydrated ingredients. So easy to do. A youtuber called Rose Red does some interesting stuff, so does Heidi at Rain Country. Rose Red likes to do meals with "fast beans", which I also like alot...they are cooked beans that are then dehydrated. You can dehydrate canned cooked beans, or cook dry beans first, then dehydrate. What you get is a great ingredient that is "just add water", no cooking required. She has a taco mix/burrito mix recipe that I like, that I've sealed in jars. Heidi dehydrates just about everything, so there's more visual ideas. I do like doing tomatoes, probably have too many done, but many I've ground up for tomato powder, and that is kinda like instant tomato sauce or paste, depending on how much water you add. There's alot of good dehydrated food recipe books out there, too.

 

[Pearl]

I have two excalibur dehydrators I use a lot. If you're looking for savory ideas, look at some of the "meals in a jar" recipes on line, there's so many of them. I have alot of those stored, plus just dehydrated ingredients. So easy to do. A youtuber called Rose Red does some interesting stuff, so does Heidi at Rain Country. Rose Red likes to do meals with "fast beans", which I also like alot...they are cooked beans that are then dehydrated. You can dehydrate canned cooked beans, or cook dry beans first, then dehydrate. What you get is a great ingredient that is "just add water", no cooking required. She has a taco mix/burrito mix recipe that I like, that I've sealed in jars. Heidi dehydrates just about everything, so there's more visual ideas. I do like doing tomatoes, probably have too many done, but many I've ground up for tomato powder, and that is kinda like instant tomato sauce or paste, depending on how much water you add. There's alot of good dehydrated food recipe books out there, too.

You are amazing!!

 

[Amish Heart]

Not really. But super tired from all this partying....
Ready for bed.
Hey, my dehydrators are filled with cayenne pepper at the moment.

 

[Pearl]

Not really. But super tired from all this partying....
Ready for bed.
Hey, my dehydrators are filled with cayenne pepper at the moment.

You are amazing

 

[Caribou]

I have a large slow cooker. I toss in 4 or 5 chicken thighs, a quart of stock, 10 cans of various vegetables including 4 cans of various beans, a couple cups or so of barley, one cube of bullion, and garlic. You could use dried veggies rather than canned. You might have to increase the fluid if you use dried veggies rather than canned. I'm diabetic and learned that the barley has a low glycemic index. Not only does this reduce my blood sugar but it reduces my weight. I use hulless barley which is a type of barley where the hulls typically fall off with little processing. The whole grain nature of this helps my diet though it takes a bit longer to cook.

 

[OldSchool]

@jishinsjourney
I really like my little nesco for greens. I dehydrate kale and chard then crumble it into all sorts of dishes to help us get more greens- yes especially in winter.
Also on the diabetic front: you can make jerky. Either meat strips or hamburger type. What you make can be so much healthier than what is offered in the stores.
Most of the veggies, I do use for things like soups or stews. It takes far less room, is lighter and shelf stable vs other methods. (Think power outages).
I do love my dried apricots .
If I think of more, I will share.
There is a dehydrating thread- might have to scroll through and see what folks are drying.

Also - know she’s busy today but will call on @Amish Heart She does quite a bit also.

https://www.homesteadingforum.org/threads/dehydrating.410/
Must be thread you mentioned. I’ll have to do more reading there. In fact I have lots more reading to do in this Cooking, Recipes, Preserving Foods section. Lots of good threads and great posts.

I have round Nesco, was a Christmas gift from my sister, from my wish list. She said “you better use it”. So far all I’ve done was beef jerky. Was a Worcestershire recipe.

 

[jishinsjourney]

@d_marsh I wsa thinking similarly, but also with the adage “eat your preps!”, so I want to make sure we’ve got things on hand we’ll actually use day-to-day. Soup mixes are great for winter, especially for the “dang it what do I want for lunch” moments.

@snappy1 y’know, we normally do our potatoes roasted, but scalloped sounds like a nice change of pace now and then!

@LadyLocust I am a huge fan of dried apricots — the California style, where they’re split in half and still have that sweet-tartness. Not so much the whole dried Turkish style that are sugary sweet. I have never tried drying them myself. Any tips? Obviously we’re well past the season, but being able to get them from my local farmer early next summer and dry them myself would cut down on “oh man I gotta pick up a pack next time I’m in California.”

We don’t do much jerky, because we don’t snack much and the grocery store stuff is so pricey! I know it can be useful for turning into soup as well, but haven’t experimented with that. It would be nice to have for hiking and for trips, though, for sure.

 

[jishinsjourney]

@Amish Heart Thank you so much! I’ll definitely look into both Rose Red and Heidi. I’d been pondering the dried beans, but hadn’t tried making them yet. When I normally cook beans, I’ll season them up with onion and garlic and a couple pieces of bacon. I’m pretty sure I’d want to leave the bacon out for this process, but the onion and garlic should still be okay, right? Usually I cook up a couple pounds and just freeze them, pot liquor and all.

I hadn’t thought about using tomato powder to make tomato paste. I wish my garden was big enough for growing a sauce/paste crop. (I swear, if I ever move again, it will be somewhere that I can have a massive vegetable garden without going ten rounds with an HOA …) For now I’ll have to check in with some of the farmers’ market folks and see what they’ve got in the way of plum tomatoes.

@Caribou We haven’t tried barley with my husband’s diabetes yet. It contains some gluten, and gluten seems to be an issue for him. Once he’s back and stable on his blood sugar, we might give it a try. But good to know, and probably still useful even if we end up doing quinoa instead.

@OldSchool Awesome, thank you for the link! I’m definitely going to go read through that as soon as I get a chance. Homemade jerky is wonderful — I haven’t made it since I was a Girl Scout, but I recall it being fantastic. That was a really fun little troop experience — we made bread, butter, jerky, and jam. I’m surprised I still remember after all this time.

 

[Amish Heart]

I'd leave out the bacon when dehydrating, but you could add real bacon bits to the dehydrated end result.

 

[LadyLocust]

I have two excalibur dehydrators I use a lot. If you're looking for savory ideas, look at some of the "meals in a jar" recipes on line, there's so many of them. I have alot of those stored, plus just dehydrated ingredients. So easy to do. A youtuber called Rose Red does some interesting stuff, so does Heidi at Rain Country. Rose Red likes to do meals with "fast beans", which I also like alot...they are cooked beans that are then dehydrated. You can dehydrate canned cooked beans, or cook dry beans first, then dehydrate. What you get is a great ingredient that is "just add water", no cooking required. She has a taco mix/burrito mix recipe that I like, that I've sealed in jars. Heidi dehydrates just about everything, so there's more visual ideas. I do like doing tomatoes, probably have too many done, but many I've ground up for tomato powder, and that is kinda like instant tomato sauce or paste, depending on how much water you add. There's alot of good dehydrated food recipe books out there, too.

Ha I have tomatoes on there as I type. I like to put them in herbed olive oil for Italian dishes.

@d_marsh I wsa thinking similarly, but also with the adage “eat your preps!”, so I want to make sure we’ve got things on hand we’ll actually use day-to-day. Soup mixes are great for winter, especially for the “dang it what do I want for lunch” moments.

@snappy1 y’know, we normally do our potatoes roasted, but scalloped sounds like a nice change of pace now and then!

@LadyLocust I am a huge fan of dried apricots — the California style, where they’re split in half and still have that sweet-tartness. Not so much the whole dried Turkish style that are sugary sweet. I have never tried drying them myself. Any tips? Obviously we’re well past the season, but being able to get them from my local farmer early next summer and dry them myself would cut down on “oh man I gotta pick up a pack next time I’m in California.”

We don’t do much jerky, because we don’t snack much and the grocery store stuff is so pricey! I know it can be useful for turning into soup as well, but haven’t experimented with that. It would be nice to have for hiking and for trips, though, for sure.

I cut them in half, pull the pit, and put on the dehydrator until the right dryness. Then I seal them in mason jars (or I would make myself sick eating them all)
You want tomatoes, come on over. I am having to invent things to do with them . We’ve made as much salsa as we have peppers for.

 

[jishinsjourney]

@Amish Heart Good call, I’ll remember that. Also, thanks again for the links. I practically devoured Heidi’s Youtube feed today. She’s great.

@LadyLocust I wish! Can we get some of the smart people in this forum to invent a country folder so I can fold up the states in between us and come visit?

 

[Patchouli]

@jishinsjourney if you know anyone who hunts safe deer (the unsick ones), you can make jerky from them. A friend would clean out his freezer and give us his leftover deer from the year before, my LH would make jerky using the dehydrator. It was the best.
We did use it for fruit too but I haven't done much else with it.
Great thread.

 

[elkhound]

Not really. But super tired from all this partying....
Ready for bed.
Hey, my dehydrators are filled with cayenne pepper at the moment.

Yes really ! off the chart type...my 2 cents.

 

[jishinsjourney]

@jishinsjourney if you know anyone who hunts safe deer (the unsick ones), you can make jerky from them. A friend would clean out his freezer and give us his leftover deer from the year before, my LH would make jerky using the dehydrator. It was the best.
We did use it for fruit too but I haven't done much else with it.
Great thread.

I do, actually! But his hunt went poorly last year and neither he nor his father managed to shoot anything — unfortunate, because he actually managed to get an elk tag last year.

It sounded like a number of other hunters scared off their targets early in the hunt, both times. I am hopeful that they’ll get something this year. I’ve already promised to help pay for my friend’s deer tag, if only because I’n not allowed to shoot the ones that live right here in my suburb!

My husband occasionally threatens to get a tag and find out what he needs to do to hunt the ones that live here with a boar spear!

 

[jishinsjourney]

So I thought I’d post a follow-up. I took a gander at some of the things on the Rain Country youtube channel that Amish recommended (thank you yet again), and decided to try dehydrated chicken.

I bought one of the Costco rotisserie chickens — they’re cheap ($5), reasonably tasty, and huge (we get 3 protein-heavy meals out of one not counting the broth), and if it didn’t work out, hey, it was only $5.

I shredded it up and froze it according to her directions, then thawed and dehydrated.

It turned out fantastic! Light and crispy, definitely snackable, and aside from the thickest pieces which stayed a bit chewy, reconstituted very well. I made enchiladas and if I hadn’t known how it had been constructed, probably wouldn’t have guessed.

Very pleased, will be doing more. By the way, you can cram two Costco chicken breasts, dehydrated, into a pint jar.

 

[Amish Heart]

You're becoming a dehydrating expert! Well done!!

 

[LadyLocust]

I’m making pea soup (and hamhocks) for lunch tomorrow- yep, used dehydrated peas

 

[jishinsjourney]

I’m making pea soup (and hamhocks) for lunch tomorrow- yep, used dehydrated peas

That sounds amazing. I’m coming over!

 

[jishinsjourney]

You're becoming a dehydrating expert! Well done!!

Ha, thank you! Not an expert yet, I still have to get some of those silicone trays for liquidy things, but I’m looking forward to doing that and trying out drying cooked winter squash. I love the stuff but it takes so much room in the freezer.

 

[LadyLocust]

Ha, thank you! Not an expert yet, I still have to get some of those silicone trays for liquidy things, but I’m looking forward to doing that and trying out drying cooked winter squash. I love the stuff but it takes so much room in the freezer.

Do you like spaghetti squash?

 

[jishinsjourney]

Do you like spaghetti squash?

I do, but there is never enough squash in a spaghetti squash! If I have to roast a whole squash for one meal, that’s a hassle. Granted, being able to roast in bulk and dehydrate might improve that …

 

[LadyLocust]

I do, but there is never enough squash in a spaghetti squash! If I have to roast a whole squash for one meal, that’s a hassle. Granted, being able to roast in bulk and dehydrate might improve that …

I roast 3 at a time (cut in half) then dehydrate. Then they cook up quickly (more like regular pasta). I also like the texture better. I never do really get spaghetti looking noodles from the squash but they are good nonetheless.

 

[jishinsjourney]

So having experimented with the silicone trays, I am back to “I want a new dehydrator”. I have one of those square Nescos with the hole in the center. No, not the circular Nesco that everyone else uses, this one is square.

What i have discovered is that apparently, the center of each of the square trays is slightly lower than where the tray joins the outer edge, so they all slope very slightly towards the center.

You can imagine how useful this is (not), when you’re attempting to dehydrate chicken broth into boullion. I am told you can fit two cups of liquid onto those silicone trays, and I’m sure you can … if they’re flat.

Disgruntlement aside, the boullion (all 3.5 cups instead of possibly two quarts, reduced down to something like 1/4 cup) that I did get is pretty tasty.

 

[Amish Heart]

I like the square box dehydrators for that reason. I have two Excaliburs that I run, and they are excellent. For liquids, though, I put glass pie pans on the trays and it makes the whole process easier. And I use the pans for dehydrating baked beans and anything juicy and messy. I do have the silicon sheets for the racks, but there's no lip on them.

 

[jishinsjourney]

If I could fit pans on this thing, I absolutely would try that next. It’s unfortunately sized all wrong for that.

I’ve asked my husband for a new dehydrator for Christmas — not sure if it’ll be an Excalibur or something a little less expensive (Cosori? Cabela’s?), but for sure I do want something that will work better.

I have seen some silicone sheets with a lip edge for the Excalibur and the other square box dehydrators on Amazon. I think they’re by Bright Kitchen?