Recommended food deydrators?

[Mutley]

We bought the fowlers dehydrator. About a hundred bucks new on eBay. We could do with another few purée sheets ( the soft plastic round liners which allow dehydration of stews ets..). Make sure you get one with a variable heat setting. Dehydrating meat under 65 deg I think, is dangerous. Vegies need a lower heat setting.
My favorite dehy'd recipes...chilli con carne, spag Bol, any risotto, any curry provided meat is in small cubes and a cooked lentil dish like Dahl dehydrates very well. You will pay for the dehydrator in a few trips, compared to buying dehy'd meals. Please pm me for some more advice if needed...

[John Sheridan]

Woudl 70c be safe for meat, that's as far as mine go's up to

????

I need some of those trays, but from what I hear glad bake material works just as good



Cheers.

[Onestepmore]

There are often hardly used dehydrators for sale on e-bay. I'd say to steer clear of the cheaper ones that don't have variable temperature.
I've been researching (so hubby can buy one for my birthday in November) and have to decide between a Fowlers, an Excalibur (most expensive, has square trays that slide out rather than round ones stacked on top of each other) or the Ezidry Snackmaker (the Ezidry Classic doesn't have temperature variation control). Fowlers certainly seems to have easily available accessories like solid drying liners, filter cleaners and additonal trays. Any comments from those of you who have used these as to which is superior?
I have a home vege garden so plan on drying excess fruit etc, will have a go at making jerky, and after reading these posts will definitely try making some more interesting hiking meals

[wayno]

a fan oven or a microwave on low can be used to dehydrate food

[corvus]

There are often hardly used dehydrators for sale on e-bay. I'd say to steer clear of the cheaper ones that don't have variable temperature.
I've been researching (so hubby can buy one for my birthday in November) and have to decide between a Fowlers, an Excalibur (most expensive, has square trays that slide out rather than round ones stacked on top of each other) or the Ezidry Snackmaker (the Ezidry Classic doesn't have temperature variation control). Fowlers certainly seems to have easily available accessories like solid drying liners, filter cleaners and additonal trays. Any comments from those of you who have used these as to which is superior?
I have a home vege garden so plan on drying excess fruit etc, will have a go at making jerky, and after reading these posts will definitely try making some more interesting hiking meals

G'day Onestepmore,
I use a Fowlers Vacola Ultimate 4000 and it works a treat and if you make your own Jerky you will never buy commercial stuff ever again
corvus

[Onestepmore]

A couple of weeks ago I bought a hardly used Fowlers dehydrator with 4 drying trays from e-bay for $71 plus $11 postage - new they are $169. It was missing the instruction booklet but I also bought a 2nd hand general dehydrator info/recipe book for $4.

It's incredibly easy to use, everything worked out really well except for the strawberry leather (I don't think I spread it evenly enough as the edges were brittle while the middle bits were still gooey - my 11 year old son ate it all happily anyway )
So far I've just done a few sessions with apple rings, sliced strawberries, bananas and kiwifruit as trail mix, and lunchbox snacks for my children. I think I'll get a few more trays to make it more efficient time and energy-wise (the Fowlers can take up to 12) I also need more than one fruit leather tray.
I made some yogurt today, so will give that a try dried, to use this weekend on a Blue Mountains overnighter as a cereal topper - I would never have thought of dehydrating yoghurt until reading about it here.
Next step is to try out some of the dried dinner recipes posted in this forum, and I definitely want to marinate some roo and beef and make some jerky.

So, summary - I'm very happy with Fowler's dehydrator

[north-north-west]

That's the one thing that tempts me. Haven't the time or motivation to cook all my own walking food but I eat a lot of jerky whilst walking and I'd love to do my own with roo meat.

[Onestepmore]

That's the one thing that tempts me. Haven't the time or motivation to cook all my own walking food but I eat a lot of jerky whilst walking and I'd love to do my own with roo meat.

This you-tube vid is pretty good.
He uses a regular oven, and is using beef, but roo woould be awesome imo!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MZiRrf2Z ... _eRte_C2nE

Edit: hmmm, link didn't work, oh well, just cut n paste

[walkinTas]

Edit: hmmm, link didn't work, oh well, just cut n paste

You just need to put the "MZiRrf2Zip4" bit between youtube markup.

like this

Code: Select all

[youtube]MZiRrf2Zip4[/youtube]

[Onestepmore]

cool, ty for the tip

[Rob A]

Just lay your dead meat out in the sun. I just grill the daylights out of lean meat and it seems good for a week or more. Ok you have to use it as a to add to whatever else you have, dry noodles, rice, veg ....

[Onestepmore]

Just lay your dead meat out in the sun.

isn't that called roadkill?