A few tips for dehydrating with an old fashioned food dehydrator

Hi all!  I have owned a basic dehydrator for almost 20 years and (fingers crossed) it keeps on going.  These old fashioned dehydrators are not as sleek and stylish as the new ones like the Excalibur models and removing small or thin items can be tricky so I have a few tips that may help you make your dehydrating run smoother.

1. For sticky items like tomato slices, I cut parchment circles to line my trays with, all but the bottom tray which I leave empty.  (I watch very carefully while there's parchment paper in it because I am concerned about fire.  I've never had a problem, but to stay on the safe side, I watch it.)  I place things like tomatoes and strawberry fruit leather on the parchment until they are dry to touch and are no longer sticky.

At that point, I remove parchment and place the slices directly on trays.  It does add a little more time to the process, but they do not stick and tear apart.

2. When removing dehydrated items, I like to place a few rows of wax paper on my counter and turn the trays over to remove the dehydrated food.  That way, I waste nothing because the wax paper catches it all and I can pick up the wax paper and use it like a funnel to get everything into the jar or bag.

3. Sometimes, I  use a skewer or some other slim object to gently push items off of the tray cells as in this case with these cabbage grates:

4. Things don't stick to the wax paper.

Here's that cabbage all bagged up now.

What tips or tricks have you learned along the way?

Please share them by leaving a comment.

Thank you.

What's Hopping Around Here?

This week I have been working hard in the garden.  

I've planted several winter transplants and prepped soil for several more beds.  The Hubby is working on making me a few compact conduit hoop houses for beds without cold frames, so I am hoping to extend my season in all of my garden beds.

I harvested heirloom golden concord grapes and made some into juice and tomorrow I plan to turn that into grape jelly.  I will post how I did it next week.  I will be using the Ball Blue Book recipe and instructions.

I also harvested and processed yet another tomato sauce batch.

I dehydrated more red sweet peppers and grated zucchini successfully.

I stocked up on several pounds of dried beans and put them in canning jars.

I had a mystery guest raid a few plants in the garden overnight, the tracks lead me to think it's a neighbor's loose dog.  He tore off a few tomatoes, crushed them and threw them around and tromped through the new transplant beds.  Luckily, I only lost a few seedlings this time.  I am going to have to remember to close our property gate at night.

I also spent a few hours at the school farm treating the organic crops with two different biological helpers Actinovate and Superzyme.  

The Actinovate is a good bacteria product that you can apply to the soil.  The bacteria will live in your soil and produce chemicals that inhibit fungi and stimulate plant growth.  

The Superzyme is a product made from two Trichoderma bacteria and good fungi that colonize your plant's root system (locking out bad things) and are pathogenic toward bad fungi.

The only thing we did this week for the conventional crops was to have the professor spray a foliar application of Imidacloprid (aka brand name: Bayer Advantage) to control sucking insects like white fly and aphid which are a huge problem here in Fall.  If you google the chemical you will find that it is actually a nicotinoid (it comes from the nicotiana (nicotine) plant).  It is a neurotoxin, and a non-selective insect killer (it's very toxic to honeybees) so it's not advisable to use in an area with blooming flowers because you will kill many beneficials.  The professor opted to use it now, the transplants are only a few weeks old, not blooming, not attractive to bees, so it should be safe for our field now.

Sorry my post is a bit late, but we drove up the coast to yet another fantastic family wedding yesterday.
Our family is FULL OF LOVE lately. hehe.

My favorite little cousin Raymond married the woman of his dreams in this quaint country church in the mountains and we could not be happier for him.  May they have many great years together.

To all my blog friends reading this post- may you have a blessed week and THANK YOU for reading.

This post has been linked up to two of my favorite BLOG HOPS- Deborah Jean's Farmgirl Friday Blog Hop,  Homestead Revival's Preparedness Challenge #27 & Homestead Barn Hop #29!

YOU can link up to those blogs below.

NEW READERS-  Please follow this link by clicking HERE to read more Preparedness Challenge blog posts at Homestead Revival.


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What's Hopping?

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Things have been very busy around this lil homestead for about eight weeks.

The garden has been generous this summer and I've spent many hours this week canning and dehydrating.  

I've made two more batches of tomato sauce and 19 jars of mild salsa utilizing Laurie of Common Sense Homesteading's recipe.  

I tweak it a bit, I add more garlic, cilantro, and cumin, but the rest is her recipe.  It tastes better than any other canned salsa recipe I have found.  YUM!

I am back in school, FARM SCHOOL that is.  Last Friday was Farm lab day.  We planted 11,000 seedlings at the school farm.  We planted half of the field organic, and half of it conventional.  Throughout the semester we will treat the organic field using only organic methods and the conventional field will get commercial conventional methods.  I will report lessons learned

 My son's wedding took place a week ago and I am now the proud Mama of Jon and his lovely bride Samantha.  I've always wanted a daughter, now I have one. Yippee.

I've been reworking my raised garden beds as plants peter out.  So far, I have vine beans, lima beans, snow peas, arugula, garlic, carrots, daikon, romaine, green and red leaf lettuce, broccoli, and cabbage in.  Still have lots to do, but so many summer plants are still putting out acceptable levels of veggies so I hate to remove them.  I have 16 tomato plants that are giving me lots of tomatoes to can every three or four days.  I have lima, fava, and red runner beans giving me dried beans for next season.  I have eggplants, jalapeno, cucumbers, yellow squash, huckleberry, and zucchini still blossoming and fruiting. 

I learn something important this week.  Always research and confirm species before trying any wild plant.  I found what looked to be a volunteer huckleberry inside my greenhouse.  Safety conscious me, I did my research and discovered that it was black nightshade, poisonous vegetation and green berries.  I also discovered that another volunteer near the front door is more poisonous pokeberry.  Moral to the story- check everything out BEFORE trying it.  

 Black Nightshade

Chickalita Huckleberry

Next job- picking, juicing, and canning golden concord grapes and black currants.  Have a great week everybody.

Preparedness Challenge...

LINK UP HERE!

In my dehydrators I'm dehydrating Fruit- strawberries and raspberries.  I am following the instructions I found from the how to garden advice website LINK HERE.  

 

In the oven, I am dehydrating more corn using my BFF Michelle's recipe LINK HERE.  I tried it last week for the first time and was very happy with the results.  The corn tasted sweet and nutty when it was done.

I am also experimenting with my new homemade yogurt.  I am trying to separate the curds and whey to have  cream cheese.  I have only just begun, but I am really excited.

This last month has flown by, and I am learning so many new skills and honing others.  Within the last several weeks I have:
- learned how to pressure can veggies
- learned how to make homemade tomato sauce
- expanded my dehydration skills
- expanded my freezer preservation skills
- learned how to make lacto-fermented pickles
-learned how to make yogurt
and more...

I am thankful for the Preparedness Challenge and all of the contributors.  I have learned so much from all of you.  Thank you for sharing such important, practical knowledge.

Now, I am going to bed.  Goodnight!

FARMGIRL FRIDAY FARM HOP!

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WELCOME FARM GIRLS!  

This week has been crazy around our little suburban farm.

I am back in school again, veggie crop production (my last class) graduation next May.  I worked hard at the school farm yesterday.  The class will be planting two separate fields: one conventional (utilizing current commercial technology ie: herbicide and insecticide) and one organic (using only organic methods of IPM).  I am anxious to see the result; although I already know from experience that the conventional field will yield a larger volume of crops, but they will be contaminated just like the ones at the supermarket...

Anyway, it got up to 108 degrees in the field as we manually mixed in 7.5 tons of organic compost into the organic field (it was a 50/50 blend of steer manure and composted green waste) followed by 90 units (lbs) of an organic fertilizer made from composted chicken manure and blood meal.  Then, we spread ninety units (lbs) of Triple Fifteen fertilizer (15-15-15 blend of N-P-K) into the conventional field.  We filled up 5 gallon buckets of each amendment and spread it ourselves by hand.  I woke up today with aching forearms and shoulders.  I guess at my age I should have taken it easier, but I resent the idea that I can't keep up with the teenagers, fooey.  (I forgot my camera, but I will take it next week when we start inserting transplant plugs)

We don't yet know what kind of vegetable we'll be planting, the professor says it's early for our region so he will have to take whatever he can get.  I was hoping to get to plant something that I have had trouble with in my home garden in the past. That way, I might learn something.  I know it will be fun, whatever we plant.  Our school is great.  At harvest time, they let us dig the crops and donate them to organizations that feed local families.  I have helped others dig their crops before and it's a fun day.

Here at home, I have been finishing up a few small creative projects for my son Jon's wedding that is now just a week away.  Almost done. Whew!  He took a load of stuff up yesterday.  I will have the last few done before tomorrow, then on to my last project, his wedding cake.  I am making a modest tier wedding cake for the kids.  I will post pictures and the recipes as I go along this week.

Less than an hour ago, I finished up a batch of homemade tomato sauce.  It was my second batch, but the first one I canned.  I canned about 20 tomatoes and got 3 quart jars.  By the time it cooks down, there's not a lot left, haha.  So much water in tomatoes, I guess. Anyway, the hubby LOVES it.  It's my own recipe (though I confess, I got the basic instruction and how to from several of you in blogland) and it's very simple.

I blanch my tomatoes in boiling water for 3-5 minutes (depending on the variety- some separate from their skins faster) and take them immediately from the boiling water to ice water.  Next, I remove their skins completely, core and quarter the tomatoes, and puree them in a food processor until super fine, and then pour them into my tall, large stockpot to cook down.

To the stockpot I add cleaned, chopped, and pureed garlic, celery, onion, fresh basil, and sometimes bell pepper.  I let it cook down, stirring regularly as it boils.  Once it has cooked down measurably, I add about a tablespoon of balsamic vinegar of Modena, a 1/16-1/8 cup brown sugar, a tablespoon or two of olive oil, and salt and pepper to taste.  Make sure it has cooked down before you add the seasonings otherwise, you might accidentally end up with a sauce that's too salty or too sweet.  I began this last batch with 25 cups of tomato puree and ended up after cooking down with 3 quarts full and just enough to cover two plates of pasta and veggies for me and the hubby for lunch, so I'd say the liquid cooks down about half.  To can it, I just poured it into hot, sterile prepared canning jars, placed my lids finger tight, and water boiled it for ten minutes.  No pressure canning for these jars today.  Had I added meat to the sauce, would have required pressure canning with meat canning requirements.  I'd rather add fresh meat when I prepare it later.

My garden is still putting out the produce.  Everyone else I have talked to have told me that their squash and zucchini are slowing down, but mine have heated back up again.  My cucumbers have slowed production this week.  Good thing too, my refrigerator is still full of all those lacto-fermented pickles.

I picked all my corn ( a small 4x4 plot and followed my BFF Michelle's recipe to dehydrate the kernels and it worked like a charm.

I have been dehydrating this summer, more than in the last 5 years combined. ( I blame this on the heat)  This season, I have dehydrated nectarine, peach, apple, corn, carrots, eggplant, zukes and yellow squash, potatoes (thought I do not like how they look, too dark), and celery and celery leaf.  Today, I ground up dried celery leaf into salt to make my own celery salt.  It's pretty and very fragrant.

I plan to make my first batch of homemade yogurt cheese this week, I hope it turns out...

I hope you Farm Girls have a great week on your Farms!