Thread: Food Dehydrator

I have been ask what I might want for Xmas and thought a food Dehydrator might be a good idea. has anyone ever used one? What did you make and did it taste good?
Backcountry meals are expensive and looking to make my own.
Any advice would be greatly appreciated.

A dehydrator is different to back country meals. The bc meals etc are freeze dryed which is a different process. Dehydrators still have their uses tho. Wife uses hers for drying herbs and chillies etc that she grows

yep. just made jerky in mine. also dehydrated black pudding is bloody delicious !

Dehydrated banana chips go well too

You can definitely make your own dehydrated meals. Venison mince is ideal as it is low in fat. Add dehydrated vegetables (carrots, peas, sweet corn, beans) and you are good to go. We keep ours in the freezer until we need them and add the noodle flavor sachets when we rehydrate and heat them.

Originally Posted by gonetropo

..........black pudding is bloody delicious !

I see what you did there, very clever.

Originally Posted by Andygr

I see what you did there, very clever.

well if i said haemoglobin it might be considered an anti lgba-z123 thing

I started making meals with limited success, I just use ours for dried liver, lung & heart dog treats now but save heaps.

On special now too.
https://www.briscoes.co.nz/product/1...BoC9OIQAvD_BwE

briscoes also has a good deal on cast iron pans too. best way to cook a steak as they hold heat like crazy so the steak seals not boils.
then again 10-15 seconds a side is well cooked anyway

We brought a Sunbeam "Food Lab" dehydrator about 4 years ago, it has slide out trays in a cabernet style dehydrator. It's easier to use than the old round ones. I've been dehydrating my meals for a while now, there's something with the commercial freeze dried meals that disagrees with me so doing my own is much better. Any stews, spag bol or any other left overs from a meal that might be dehydrated, I would put in the dehydrator, when they are done, I put them in a vacuum pack bag, put a date on them and then freeze them, I usually dehy pasta separately or use minute rice to bulk them out. To rehydrate them, I simmer them in a skillet on my stove, it takes about as long as someone else wait for their freeze dried meal to be ready, I've found that by not dehydrating it too much, it rehydrates much quicker and tastes better. I found a really good web-site (https://www.trail.recipes/ ) that gave me some really good pointers on dehydrating. The other interesting thing about my dehy meals is that they take up much less room than the equivalate freeze dried. A mate and I were going into the Caples for 5 days, his freeze dried meals took up 3 times the volume in space that my meals did, but weight wise, they were similar. If you get one, play around with it and try different things so you end up with something that works for you.

And be careful doing biltong/jerkey etc, I made heaps because it's cheaper than buying it. I then proceeded to eat way more than I should.

We have had good results with this guys recipes if you can find a copy https://campfirecreations.co.nz/fast...ight-the-book/

A bit more prep than a dirty old dehy but if you do it in bulk every few months you’re set for a few trips.

I keep a jar each of dehydrated seasoned venison and chicken mince in freezer along with assorted veges and wack it all into a ziplock with some veges and carbs and tastes pretty decent. I will chuck it in a billy of water to soak for for 30-60 mins and then a quick simmer and done. Doesn't take much longer than a backcountry to cook and heck of a lot cheaper.

Venison jerky makes a great hill snack.

Went through a couple of brisco special dehydrators but found the EziDry ones the best, locally made still I think and have met a couple of folks who have been running same unit for 10+years, decent capacity and can go huge if you buy extra trays - I think they were called ‘harvest maid’ originally.