# Dehydrating



## jerodjacks (Aug 13, 2010)

what foods are best to dehydrate
&
how do you store them


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## JustCliff (May 21, 2011)

You can dehydrate many different types of food. The simple answer is, dehydrate what you eat.
Try looking over this site:
Dehydrate2Store.com | Welcome - Educating and Helping Those Who Want To Learn About Dehydration

I store in jars,bucket,bags and some cans. All depends on the dehydrated item and what you will do with it. 
Short term storage
Long term storage
For your BOB,BOV or camping or just using around the homestead.
Let us know the kind of foods you want to do and we can get you going.


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## goshengirl (Dec 18, 2010)

I'll second the Dehydrate 2 Store videos (JustCliff's link). Tammy is great!

I think the easiest thing to start with is dehydrating frozen veggies. Watch the Dehydrate 2 Store video on that. To store, I like to use mason jars because dehydrated food can be pretty brittle, and the jars are protective. If you have a Food Saver, you can get a mason jar attachment for it that sucks air out. Or you can get oxygen absorbers to put in the jars. Or both.

The reason why the frozen veggies are so easy is because all you do is buy up some items on sale (whatever veggies you like), open the bag, put the veggies on the dehydrator tray, and let 'r rip. Right this moment I have a bunch of frozen veggies in the dehydrator - bought up a bunch of items (on sale) that I like to put in soups or for making broth - they'll be all dehydrated and ready to go the next time I find chicken on sale and make chicken broth. I also love it when frozen shredded or diced potatoes go on sale - they dehydrate and rehydrate very easily.

You can dehydrate fresh veggies, too - they just need to be handled differently. Some need blanching before dehydrating, some need to soak in lemon juice first, some need both. Frozen veggies already have those necessary steps taken care of. But if you want to work with fresh veggies, search the internet for "dehydrate _______" - you'll find loads of info, oftentimes conflicting, but you learn to go with what works for you. For example, I wanted to dehydrate potato slices and found info that said to cook first, others said to dehydrate raw (all said to soak in lemon juice). Tried a few different ways, decided I like the barely cooked method best. 

You can also dehydrate meat. I like ground meat best (beef, pork, chicken, turkey) - just cook it up (breaking it up into small pieces), rinse it off, and place thinly on trays. A half-pint mason jar holds about 0.8 lbs of beef - and that works great with one box of Hamburger Helper. 

If you have a surplus of eggs (if you have chickens, or just plain find a bunch of eggs on sale) there are You Tube videos on dehydrating cooked scrambled eggs. 

Hope that helps. Feel free to ask more questions as you go along.


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## sailaway (Mar 12, 2009)

An interesting thread, I have made beef jerkey and dehydrated apples & bananas so far. I had 2 Kmart inexpensive plastic dehydraters. The jerkey was made from brisket that was marinated in a mixture of liquid smoke, soy sauce and terryake sauce. I usually let it soak for 2 days. When I put it on the dehydrator I add pepper, chili powder or some other spice.

The fruit gets soaked in lemon juice before dehydrating, this keeps it from turning brown.


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## gypsysue (Mar 27, 2010)

Onions. Buy them on sale and chop them up, then dry them. They've got to be one of the easiest things to dry. Peppers are pretty easy too. Cut them open, remove the seeds and other innards, cut them in strips (like for stir fry) or chop them up, then dry them. 

Other than that, we've dried about every fruit or vegetable there is, and also herbs, and eggs. I've seen some very interesting ideas here on the forum about things to dehydrate, including leftovers, like spaghetti, that can later be used as a quick meal or camping food. I've even seen people mention dehydrating soup!


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## Davarm (Oct 22, 2011)

If you have a food saver the advice by "goshengirl" about the jar attachment is good to keep in mind. Many dehydrated foods will poke holes in the vacuum seal bags.

With potatoes, I also prefer the lightly cooked(goshengirl) way also. Have found that no matter how long you soak Russets in lemon juice or even vinegar, that will almost always "turn(darken)" to some degree. Red potatoes seem to have less of a problem with turning. Lightly cooked, they always come out pretty and translucent.


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## jerodjacks (Aug 13, 2010)

Thanks 
i was going to do lots of jerky & fruit 
good idea about frozen vegetables too


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