Fruit dehydrators, anyone?
We finally borrowed a friend's fruit dehydrator this fall to see what we thought, and we loved it. Awesome apples from the neighbor's tree and fun process with the kids. Tasty, cheap, local snack. What's not to love? But now it's time to return it, and we're wanting one of our very own, natch. I stopped by Mirador the other day, the most obvious place to snag one, but they were higher priced than I was hoping. Some quick online searches show a bunch for under $100. Do you have one you'd recommend? Where'd you get it? And for the BPA-obsessed among us (that's me!), might you know of any without it?
And finally, the fun part: aside from the obvious apples and pears, what do you dehydrate?
My favorite thing to dehydrate is mango. We also do plums, bananas, fruit leather, herbs, and many more.
Posted by: katherynei | November 14, 2008 at 09:47 PM
I got a new one at a yard sale for $3. Dried a bunch of apricots and cherries this summer. I always put the dried fruit in the freezer afterward to keep it fresh.
Posted by: latierra | November 15, 2008 at 03:09 AM
We have the Nesco Snackmaster Pro http://www.amazon.com/Nesco-American-FD-50-Snackmaster-Dehydrator/dp/B00004W4V4
It was a gift from the in laws. Looks like it has been replaced by the next version. http://www.canningpantry.com/food-jerky-dehydrators.html. Not sure plastic factor. After the usual apples and pears, I dehydrate zucchini rounds for soups and stews. Makes freezing leftovers easier as the veggies don’t get so waterlogged. I also refrigerate the dried fruit, just in case.
Posted by: courtney | November 15, 2008 at 08:14 AM
katherynei: How do you do your fruit leather? I had a few fruit leather mishaps and got discouraged.
Posted by: Lisa | November 15, 2008 at 10:36 AM
YOGURT! :) Well, not exactly. We heat a gallon of milk in a large pot, add a few specks of culture (or 2 cups from the previous batch) and let it sit on the fruit drier for 12 hours. It maintains the PERFECT temperature for making yogurt. And it's WAY cheaper than buying yogurt. With 4 kids, this saves us a good bit of money. We also do the usual suspects - apples, bananas, cranberries, raisins, prunes, tomatoes, etc.
Posted by: KE | November 15, 2008 at 11:11 PM
we just talked about fruit dehydrators last night at one of Monique Dupre's workshops (fermentation and condiments, it was fun!) and there were lots of ideas about setting racks over the fire, or drying in the oven on the lowest temperature on cookie sheets, or just out in the sun in the late summer on old sheets or something (you have to bring the fruit/nuts in at night though!). i love the idea of using heat you already have (fireplace, sun) and someone was telling me about a complicated solar oven...
anyway! I've been wanting to dry tomatoes, figs, cherries and grapes. hopefully next year i'll be all set up as (according to the sustainability people) it makes most sense to dry produce you have too much of in season; and after buying a bag of dried tart cherries at the farmer's market ($6 for 5.5 ounces) i've promised myself i'll dry the cherries from my tree next june. i think i will try dried cranberries this year since they're still in season.
Posted by: sarah gilbert | November 18, 2008 at 09:43 PM