Are there any dehydrating experts here?

[Tussiemussies]

Hello,

I received a high end dehydrator for Christmas and am really enjoying it. Does anyone else dehydrate that can share some great ideas and tips? Also what books have you used along the way?

Thanks,

Chris

[Mary B.]

Hello,

I received a high end dehydrator for Christmas and am really enjoying it. Does anyone else dehydrate that can share some great ideas and tips? Also what books have you used along the way?

Thanks,

Chris

I don't think I'm an expert but I love love love my Excalibur dehydrator.

Our favourite thing to dehydrate is apple slices, particularly Honeycrisp, which seem to dry really well, and peach slices. We serve them with tea instead of cookies -- they are just amazing. Another thing I like is my mysterious green powder, which is all kinds of stuff that's green dried and ground up in the vitamix. Greens from the garden, the last of the cilantro, bits of spinach, all kinds of stuff like that -- I find it adds a lot to soups and such.

My niece has a fantastic cookbook -- Recipes for Adventure: Healthy, hearty and homemade backpacking recipes by Glenn McAllister. It has terrific instructions for dehydrating whole meals, which she does quite regularly. (She's got four little kids. They don't actually do a heck of a lot of backpacking, but she does take a camp stove and dried chili or curry or whatever when they all go to the beach.)

Have fun!

[razz]

I have an Excalibur dehydrator as well. I love its ease of use making fruit leathers, apple slices etc.

Confession time. When I dried the veggies, I found that I didn't use the dried foods up so it was an exercise in futility. Had peppers, leeks, tomatoes, onions. I needed to change my food preparation from short notice to long-term planning to give the veggies time to rehydrate. That was the hard part.
My cookbook and drying authority is "Making and Using Dried Foods" by Phyllis Hobson. There is a lot of valuable info online as well.
Have fun!

[Tussiemussies]

Thank you Mary B and Razz...Razz I will have to look into those books! Thanks for sharing your information, now I have some new ideas!

[CathyA]

I only have a cheapo Ronco that my SIL gave me about 35 years ago. I do dehydrate rosemary in it and it does a good job. I have been dreaming of an Excalibur though.

[thinkgreen]

I have two books of really great camping recipes that include dehydrating instructions. They are written by Laurie Ann March.

A Fork in the Trail
Another Fork in the Trail

She has a couple of websites you could peek at aforkinthetrail.com or wildernesscooking.com