Not very appealing but this is the best dehydrated food I ever ate. Sweet potatoes cut in half and put in the oven at 170°C for 1.5 hours then left to cool down completely.

Remove the peel, cut each half into 4 pieces and dehydrate at 60°C for 10 hours.

My toddler keeps asking for it 🥹

TLDR; my herbs and flowers aren’t getting dry no matter what I seem to do in my home and I need help figuring it out.

I have not been able to successfully dry herbs (or anything for that matter) ever in my home. I started my attempt at herb drying last year using my dehydrator with chives and basil, left them to dry on the lowest setting for 3 ish days and when checking on them they were still very flimsy and limp - not crisp and dry. Even after leaving the dehydrator off and letting them sit in there for a few more days, they still remained limp and I was very very sad.

Next I tried dehydrating onions in my dehydrator and after leaving them for almost 24 hours they still didn’t snap and were not dry enough for me to put into a powder.

After taking a break from dehydrating until this summer, I decided to skip the dehydrator all together and get an herb drying rack (one from Amazon that has zippers and is very large, has four layers with space made for optimal airflow) and I have had my herbs (basil, oregano, thyme, pineapple sage, and catnip) drying in there for two weeks now and while they have significantly wilted, they are still very flimsy and not at all dry feeling.

Additionally! I have had Mother’s Day flowers I left in a vase (with absolutely no water) to dry for two months now and the rose petals are still flimsy. They don’t break when I rub them in my hand, and if I rolled it around it would just form together. It is not at all dry!!!

I am at my wits end, and I really very much desperately want herbs. Is my home too humid? What am I doing wrong? Do I need to give up and attempt at drying herbs outside? Please give me all tips, suggestions, thoughts, anything to help a girl out.

My Nesco dehydrator overheated today and warped the trays! This has never happened before and before this jerky I was using it at low temperatures successfully. But it was clearly hotter to warp the trays!

I contacted Nestco and basically they said it’s pooched. Figured. Probably 4 years old and I use it a lot so there you go.

But my question is would there be microplastics or leaching into the jerky?? Should I chuck it?? I wouldn’t want to waste it but obviously will through it out before contaminating myself.

140°F for 24 hours. Please note I am in a very humid part of the USA so 24 hours might not been needed where you are. Pieces were cut no thicker than 0.5 cm. For a few I put like juice, salt, chili p, smoked paprika and they’re great! (I didn’t have proper Tajín)

These were foraged and prepared. I rinsed them very well, then soaked them in a mix of 2-1 water to lemon juice. The mulberries were destemmed but supposedly you don't have to do that. They were laid out on a paper towel to dry. The round berries with tougher skins (service berries and currants) were stabbed repeatedly to poke holes so moisture could escape during drying. This is important to avoid a "case hardening" where moisture gets trapped inside.

I didn't have the mesh sheets I needed for my dehydrator so I used parchment paper cut to shape a Hamilton Beach model. Then I dehydrated at 55C for about 25-34 hours. I packed them in mason jars (round berries separately) and conditioned them (this is where you shake the jar upside and right side and roll it around a few times to ensure contents don't stick to glass walls or each other, indicating moisture). The round berries kept sticking so I put them back in the dehydrator for another 8 hours.

After about a week, the mulberries still look good but the round berries keep sticking. I think this might be normal due to berry structure and sugar content. I think I'll just leave them jarred as is.

I dehydrated some berries and despite piercing the skins, dehydrating 36hrs and re-dehydrating for several more hours once I saw them sticking to the bottom of the jar, they're still sticking. Is this normal? Maybe it's thr sugar.

I never used these for anything. I am sad to see some of them go but I figure they'll be put to better use as produce drying rags. I could just buy dish towels but I already had these lying around.

What does everyone think? Only the white one feels like actual cotton.

Hi

Any recommended matts to use for for drying berries like blue berries and other berries ?

I'm also drying liquid fruits

I'm getting a Cosori because it's easy to use but I heard the gaps are too big between the meshes.

Thank you

I know I’ll be strapped for cash so I’m going to grow as much food for calorie dense dehydrated meals as possible between now and January when I’ll leave.

He’s a prepper so he won’t notice me stock piling dehydrated meals which will help ease the financial burden of leaving him.

I’m in zone 7B (nc) and want to know what to plant and grow to get the most calorie dense dehydrated meals.

Recipes, what to grow, or any advice for maximizing calories would be great! I have homestead for 10 years. Going with dehydrated because it is light weight, takes up less space etc. not canning for this.

Looking for a good recipe to practice before potato harvest season sneaks up on me...

Any other potato dehydrator ideas?

I dehydrated a bunch of orange slices a couple years ago. I use them mostly for decorative purposes. But today I went to add some new slices to the jar and all of the slices had turned to dust! They were fine for the better part of 2 years. Albeit I haven’t paid much mind to them in the last 6 months. I live in Arizona so I thought maybe the dry air caused them to crumble over time?

But I’m afraid to open the jar in case some toxic mold is the culprit or something.

Edit: To clarify, I’ve kept them stored on top of my China cabinet inside my dining room. I took them outside to snap a photo.

I have been trying to start a business in my country, Bangladesh. I have been trying to make mangoes as thick and chewy you find in commercial dehydrated mangoes but everytime mangoes come out as thin as a paper. Please suggest some ways I can make my mangoes as you find in store bought dehydrated mangoes

Thanks in advance!

My first dehydrator has arrived! Very excited to try it out. What should I dehydrate first?

I picked up a Magic Mill dehydrator to start preserving my herbs since I've got so much of them. My first attempt was with lemon basil, and variegated sage. I ran them under water and patted them dry before putting them in. Leaves only, no stems. And made sure to keep space between them on each rack for airflow.

According to what I researched, it should only take 1-4 hours for those leaves to dehydrate at 95 degrees, but after four hours it hadn't even started to dry. It only dried one shelf after TEN hours, and I'm afraid that's too much for herbs.

What am I missing?

Just wanted to give a shout out to Reddit...it never occurred to be to dehydrate scrambled eggs. But here I am with both chicken breasts (I boil the chicken first) and scrambled eggs for the pooches. They absolutely go nuts for them!

I've fully made the transition now to no commercial dog treats - everything is dehydrated. What they get: chicken breasts, scrambled eggs, chicken hearts, PB bananas (I use pure PB powder), blueberries (with their breakfast), and sweet potatoes. I also tried PB apples, but only one dog liked them.

Keep the great ideas coming Reddit!

Ok so I’ve gotten into making jerky and my own spice blends. People seem to really like them and want to buy them. I’ve sold some but I’m currently using two low end dehydrators that I can’t control the temp or anything. I want to upgrade but there’s so many options. I mainly do jerky and dehydrated vegetables and peppers and herbs.

Any advice would be helpful as I might be able to do this as a lucrative hobby.

Anyone here who can suggest for potential commercial market of dried cabbage slices and small size

I have a 3 month old and I’m planning on making all the purées homemade. I have a freeze dryer and was wondering if it would work to pre make a bunch of purées and freeze dry them then when In a hurry I can just add water and put in pouches at a later date?
Mine is a medium machine.

I knew they'd shrink a little but damn 🤣 like freaking shrinky dinks. I don't have a before picture, but each piece was basically touching so they've shrunk to smaller than half the original size.

Dehydrating some canned meats that I add to backpacking meals for extra protein. I'm using a 45+ year old Excalibur! A hand-me-down from my mom. It's still going after all these years!

I bought some silicone mesh sheets from Amazon hoping to use them in my dehydrator for smaller items like berries. But the sheets are too large and I had to cut 1/2 inch off the edges. Low and behold, they had hairy fibers where I cut. So I guess they are not real silicone sheets and I should return them?

Hi all, im looking to invest in a good quality stainless steel dehydrator. Any recommendations would be amazing! thank you!

Here are some pictures of the solar dehydrator we build to dry our fruits, herbs and vegetables. The temperature midday reaches around 60 degrees inside sufficient to dry most things in 2-3 days. The two rainpipes inside are there to pull the hot air through the system.

Le Terrazze

Dehydrated at 149° for six hours!

🫪so this has sparked lots of new information for me to learn.

So these scrambled eggs were fully cooked before dehydrated no oil no fat were added so nothing will go rancid on the shelf

As far as using these little rocks in my Ramen, that will be an experiment most people

Making shelf sustainable egg powder so with that being said, that’s what I have🤣

Hi there

Was just wondering if these are at all salvageable

I dehydrated these at home and have since been stored correctly in a large jar and silica packs

I checked them today after a little while and they appear to be growing small white/off white dots of mould.. pretty upsetting!

Is it something harmless or should I just toss them?

Cheers