WIP - Food dehydrator

[SGL70]

In the hunt for something to read, I came across a book about dehydrating food...One thing lead to another and once more I got myself a project of limited practical use...A food dehydrator.
After reading the book I now know that most of the magic when dehydrating food is in how you treat the food items to be dehydrated....but that might be for another post.

My motives for doing this is that I think I will get tastier food than the store-bought. It might also be cheaper. Also....I was a bit bored...

I did this without any plans besides the general idea of making a box that allows for 8 screens. The dehydrating is driven by a fan, of sorts.

For the build I started off by ripping (term?) the 7 mm plywood into 2 x 55 cm x 100 cm and 1 x 35cm x 100 cm:

I glued and nailed 2 x 2 cm strips to the plywood to be able to join the sheets together:

Ending up with this:

I keep getting subtle hints indicating that I should not leave my day job (The hand saw bit me).

Out of 2 x 2 cm peices I made thingies for placing the screens:

I also made two lids - "front" and "top" (i.e. no hinges). To ventilate out the warm air I will simply use a piece of wood to keep the top lid open. The hot air will be provided by my car heater (For defrosting the inside of the car during winter...term?) placed at in fornt of the bottom...I have no clue as to efficiency, so I will do it by trial and error until I get it warm enough (i.e. place the fan at some distance from the box)

The next step in this project is to make the screens. For this purpose, I have bought mosquito net...but given this summer I rather likely to roll it around myself anytime I go out of the house. The mosis have the temperament of deranged Pit Bulls on acid at the moment.

I will post some more pics during the week...

Cheers,
Greger

 

[British Red]

We dehydrate a LOT.

That looks like a great start, but if you want a dedicated heater, you can make one from an old fashioned incandescent light bulb and a fan from an old tower PC.

Red

 

[Robson Valley]

You just wait! The more you use that, the more things you realize you can dehydrate.
My favorite is a case of ripe Roma tomatoes, sliced lengthwise in thirds and dried fairly hard and packed in olive oil.
One of the most wonderful "taste bombs" that you can put on a pizza. Plus a really stunning tomato smell fills the house as they dry.
I can buy dried romas in olive oil. The price is more than 10X my estimate for my cost, electricity included.

Dried fruit slices of just about anything beats junk snacks. How about chocolate-coated dried cherries?

 

[SGL70]

Thanks.

Do you do whole meals or do you dry variuos items that you then cook with?

Those bulbs are a bit to find nowadays. Only the low energy variety in the shops.
How many Watts should I aim for?

 

[SGL70]

You just wait! The more you use that, the more things you realize you can dehydrate.
My favorite is a case of ripe Roma tomatoes, sliced lengthwise in thirds and dried fairly hard and packed in olive oil.
One of the most wonderful "taste bombs" that you can put on a pizza. Plus a really stunning tomato smell fills the house as they dry.
I can buy dried romas in olive oil. The price is more than 10X my estimate for my cost, electricity included.

Dried fruit slices of just about anything beats junk snacks. How about chocolate-coated dried cherries?

I will try that. Saw the 'Hungry Hammock Hanger' making some pemmican on youtube. Think I am going to try that, also.

 

[Robson Valley]

I run a NESCO/American Harvest Dehydrator at about 60C/160F for the tomatoes and fruits.
Usually one big batch after another. Nevery tried to dry a meal as a package, it's mostly
treat things and items (tomatoes) that I'll cook into something else. Really hard not to just stick a fork
into a jar of the Roma slices and munch away!

Native elders told me that bison pemmican is about equal parts of dried and pounded bison meat and fat. Not much of it ever had dried berries in it.
Rocky Mountain House was a Hudson's Bay Company fur trading post. As travelling food for the traders, in 9 days they prepared 40,000lbs of pemmican done up in 90lb bison hide bags.
The really good pemmican was done up in 60lb bags. These numbers come directly from HBC record books through Canada's National Park Service. I still find it staggering.

I have several bison roasts left in the freezer. When I get another side of bison lined up this autumn, I'll slice and dry a couple of roasts as I know I can have the needed fat for nothing.

With cure and spice mix from Cabella's, making simple jerky with bison burger is really simple.
The "Jerky Pistol" packs easily and I can make round or flat strips on a cake rack in a low temp oven.
It can be quite snowy and cold in hunting season here in the mountains, the jerky is heavenly when it's frozen!

 

[Robson Valley]

I looked up some product numbers so you can get the idea of what I'm doing.
They used to stock a variety of Hi Mountain Brand cure and seasonings but looks now like a bunch of house-labelled things.
What ever. I predict it will be of top quality.

www.cabelas.ca in the Home & Cabin/ Food Preparation section.

#39551001 is a cure and seasoning kit to do 15lbs round meat or burger. $10.00 = approx 5GBP
#63045 is the Jerky Blaster which holds 1.5lb ground meat, I like the flat nozzle. $60.00 = approx 30GBP

There's a trick. Put on a plastic glove and mix the cure and seasoning into the burger. Now, you have to keep mashing it
with your hand until the texture changes from the usual ground meat appearance to something quite pasty and stringy.
You can both see and feel this change when it happens, a few minutes at most.
Then you load the pistol and form the strips. I just do long ones and break them up after they're dried. . . . none of this short bit nonsense.

 

[cranmere]

I once made a solar powered one from cardboard boxes, just for fun. It worked surprisingly well but of course cardboard won't last for long when it rains!

http://www.motherearthnews.com/diy/solar-food-dryer-zmaz81jfzraw.aspx

 

[badoosh]

Half made one last year out of scrap wood because I was bored never got round to using it.
Got a dehydrator off free cycle so will be drying out the abundance of cherry plums on my local playing fields.
Used an old computer fan wired upto an old 12v child's toy car charger which worked well and as said above used 4 light bulbs .

 

[Robson Valley]

badoosh has the right idea. I suggest adding some sort of kitchen/BBQ thermometer to monitor the temp.
Every source I read (Cabela's included) notes that the temp ought to be up to 50-60C (150F).
I guess that helps the drying before spoiling.

 

[British Red]

Thanks.

Do you do whole meals or do you dry variuos items that you then cook with?

Those bulbs are a bit to find nowadays. Only the low energy variety in the shops.
How many Watts should I aim for?

We use it as a way to store the produce that we grow. We have dried 30Kg of strawberries in the last two weeks. Dried strawberries are great in cereal, as a snack. We will also do apple rings, dried chillies, gooseberry fruit leather etc.

Doesn't need to be a lightbulb a 100w heater is fine. Dirt cheap on eBay

 

[SGL70]

Thanks for the info, folks...

The making of the screens has been paused as I succumbed to my better halfs wishes, and went for a trip to our not-so-local IKEA.
...and when I with some pride announces to the missus that I have completed the bed (with extras), I am informed that it is assembled in the wrong way....my boys head should be in the other direction...
Oh well....square one - here I come...

More to come

 

[SGL70]

More slowly than surely i have been busy making then screens

...8 screens takes its toll on an artists soul...done (sans mosi net)...

Fitted the mosi net and are good to go...first order of business will be tomatoes and onions - two things I cannot be without...

...plus I need to find my car heater...for a first run...a bit too much power, but for a trial run it will be fine

 

[British Red]

Looking very good that, keep me posted. But don't tell my wife who has sliced and dried fifty pounds of strawberries this week. She is sick of the sight of them!

 

[Robson Valley]

One of the problems that I have faced with fine mesh is that the fruit juice drools into the screens and solidifies/hardens there. Hard to clean.
I have drifted in the direction of 1/4" mesh and 1/2" plastic mesh for that reason. Really, how many mesh bars does it take to support a slice of tomato?
Dramatic air circulation seems to be a goal for rapid processing. Old onion bag mesh is perfect if you can't buy it.

Sept/14, I dried a case of the very best Roma tomatoes that I have seen in years = dark, dark red field tomatoes and not firm but HARD.
I packed them all with seasoned olive oil. Just opened another jar this evening.

BR: just explain to your beloved that when company comes, you can offer an exotic nibbly treat (dried strawberry) and not blink at all.
I'd eat those on buttered toast in the morning and jump up from the table so happy. . .. . . ..

 

[Goatboy]

The strawberries on toast with some fresh milled black pepper would make an excellent repast.

Sent via smoke-signal from a woodland in Scotland.