Grow Your Own Magazine

Hi everyone
I'm thinking about buying one of these toys for the kitchen. I was wondering if anybody has got one and if they have any experiance with them?

Bit expensive but if they work its worth it

Martin

Do you mean de humidifiers?? Have used those before when condensation a problem and are very good plus you can use the water collected on your plants. re cycle,re cycle.....

Sorry, no experience of dehydrators number 1, so can't help you there. I was thinking however of making a drying cupboard a la Nick and Johnny (Preserved) with 60 watt bulb and MDF. But that's a project for next spring I feel.(well for me anyway)

__________________
Bright Blessings
Earthbabe
If at first you don't succeed, open a bottle of wine.

A friend of my daughter had one and it was very well used. Being from SA we used it to make Biltong and dried 'wors. Worked very well - wouldn't mind one myself for all my tomatoes!

whats one of those? dexterdog

__________________
Appreciate the little things in life because one day you will realise they are the big things

It's a food dryer Dexterdog. They are huge and expensive and you lay slices of vegetables and fruit in them. Turn on for about 6 hours and you end up with dried vegetables that you can easily store until you want to use them. Then simply re-hydrate.

__________________
[

Oh, I see! wot's wrong with a slow oven? dexterdog

__________________
Appreciate the little things in life because one day you will realise they are the big things

Don't think you would get the same dryness. The food dehydrator takes all the moisture out of the vegetables. I have one and I think it is rubbish!!

__________________
[

Why? Just wondering as I want to buy one having had glowing praise from others.

Ihave a dehydrator and I really like it - my friend hated hers though .

I've done all kinds of fruit in mine and much prefer the taste to the shop bought processed stuff. Another plus is no added sugar and the end product (strawbs, kiwis etc) is really nice for snacking or sprinkling on cereal. I like its versitility as you can also use it for herbs and flowers.

I fully intended to try it on my tomatoes this year, but they seem to disappear as fast as I pick them

So is this the British version of 'Sun Dried' cos we got no sun?!!

Dehydrators are slower than slow oven. An oven doesn't really work accurately at lower than 100C, its not designed for it.

Thanks everyone. lots of replies. Will have to think about it some more. Earthbabe i like the idea of a 60watt bulb. Any more info on this one?

I've been thinking of getting on of these myself and although there are a lot of larger pricey models out there, you can also find some resonably priced ones not too much bigger than your adverage breadmaker.

I haven't made a purchase tho as it seems relativly easy to build one yourself. There are several lots of plans on the net and if you have the 'preserved' book there are some in there too. I think in the end building one is the way I'll go cause you can make them big!!!

Now if you'll excuse me I have to get back to my plans to build a veggie watering robot that will eventually take over the world and force everyone to grow their own!!!

Good luck with that Missy Moo! Will it have an anti-EC protocol in it?

__________________
Bright Blessings
Earthbabe
If at first you don't succeed, open a bottle of wine.

Has anyone tried drying fruit etc in the coolest oven on an aga? I think that gets below 100c???

Hi Everyone. Hope the festive season is going well for all of you.

My daughter bought me a dehydrator and its been in constant use since xmas day. WOW. Cant wait for next years crop of fruit and veg.

Highly reccomend one of these for storage/snacks/anything you can think of. yummy fruit tried so far. Bananas, kiwi, apple, pear, strawberrys, pineapple. also done mushrroms, tomatoes and carrots.

Number 1 suspect

Which one did she get you No1. I'm thinking of getting one with some of my birthday money (after the greenhouse/polyhouse). It'll make for some interesting pressie baskets next year for the folks.

__________________
Bright Blessings
Earthbabe
If at first you don't succeed, open a bottle of wine.

Hi Earthbabe
She got me the L'Equip one. nice machine. the fans a bit noisy but as the kitchen is on another floor it dont worry me.

Not having any other machine to judge it against i can only say that its a very simple and effective machine to use.

As for the pressies, dried rose's, lavender etc along with some dried fruit and a jar of home made preserves (got loads this year) presented in a nice way will please most of the people i normally give to.

The book has instructions for fruit leathers, snacks and differnt potpourri as well as rough guidlines for drying all sorts of foodstuffs.

quite a good machine

No 1 Suspect

I found this
http://www.thefarm.org/charities/i4at/surv/soldehyd.htm
Its how to make your own for free
so we dont need to spend any more money after all growing your own is ment to be cheapre and not about buying the latest gagit is it Mrs Dobby

__________________
Some things in their natural state have the most VIVID colors
Dobby

Even better than the light bulb one I suspect.

Cheers Mr D

__________________
Bright Blessings
Earthbabe
If at first you don't succeed, open a bottle of wine.

There's a thing called a "Stochli Dehydrator" in the organic gardening catalogue for £104.95 with extra trays available if this helps.P.S. very good catalogue with lots of goodies in it.www.OrganicCatalogue.com

I have been tentatively thinking about saving up for the dehydrator in the organic gardening catalogue, as I like to dry flower petals for pot pourri etc at the moment and I deffo want to dry tomatoes and fruits when they are harvested.
If anyone has one of these, what has your experience been of it and would you recommend it?

Ta, Kirsty

Hi All
Tried fruit leathers this time. yummy
Dobbie thats a great design. Tried a smaller one a few years ago. Worked well till the sun went down!!!! :-)

Burnie the Lequip one comes with 6 trays and a 6 year warranty and thats the reason we asked for this one.

Like most things if you search around you will find what suits you best.

Off to play again now. got some more fruits to play with and then will try them in home made ice cream and the home made bread. Might even try some in the home made yoghurt but will draw the line at trying any in my home made pasta machime, apart from the sun dried toms ........ At least i know what goes into all my food these days :-)

This is the one i have.

http://www.ukjuicers.com/dehydrators...dratorGrey.htm

Number 1 Suspect

Hi
I've got an eeziedry which I found it our local kitchen shop for £85 I think.
now in regular use. ( you can get extra trays, up to fifteen) Besides general food drying I also dry a lot of celery to grind up to make celery salt (half and half, cuts down the salt intake and tastes delicious especially in soup) and dry lots of lavender to grind up into powder to make body dusting powder.
Rose petals and flowers for pot pouri, herbs etc.
I ran out of freezer space so needed another way to preserve fruit and veg.
I found two American books on Amazon and they have some good ideas to try, must have a go at candied peel this year.
Sue