# dehydrating food before electricity



## biobacon (Aug 20, 2012)

Can anyone direct me to a resource (book, youtube, website) about how people dehydrated food before we had electricity. Ive looked and mostly I find electric dehydrating stuff or a sentence or two that says back in the day people put their food up or dried it in the sun to preserve it. Im looking for something more in depth. Thank you


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## Marcus (May 13, 2012)

http://www.dryit.com/altheat.html
http://www.squidoo.com/solar-food-dehydrator

Basically, you want warm air naturally rising to dehydrate food. In your location, you can do solar in the summer and early fall. After that, you probably want to go with something (hooks or a rack) hanging above a wood stove or other heat source.


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## biobacon (Aug 20, 2012)

Marcus said:


> http://www.dryit.com/altheat.html
> http://www.squidoo.com/solar-food-dehydrator
> 
> Basically, you want warm air naturally rising to dehydrate food. In your location, you can do solar in the summer and early fall. After that, you probably want to go with something (hooks or a rack) hanging above a wood stove or other heat source.


thanks for the info


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## hiwall (Jun 15, 2012)

out here it is very hard to keep things from dehydrating!
it is difficult to eat a whole sandwich before it drys out.


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## JustCliff (May 21, 2011)

I have a photograph of a wood heated dehydrator...... somewhere. 
It is on a historic farm in Maryland. I will have to do some digging to come up with the information.
Ok I cheated and found it in my original post on another forum. I will try and post the whole thing here.

It looks as though it is still standing and a structure of interest by the State of Maryland.
http://mht.maryland.gov/survey.html#
If you look at the middle box on this page titled Surveying Marylands Historic Properties, at the bottom is an email link and phone for a Thomas Rinehart.
Maybe a relative of the original owner now employed by the trust?
I guess the business part of the building is in the back where the chimney is. They may have more photographs and blueprints for the structure. Might be worth a try.


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## JustCliff (May 21, 2011)

Here is the current pic.


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## Riverdale (Oct 31, 2009)

With an unstable means of curing meats (ie not dehydrating), salt (or brine salt water) and cold smoking is the *only* way to go.

Meats and fish were 'cured' for thousands of years before canning or refidgeration.

If you are truely interested, find a recipe for lutfisk :eyebulge:


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