I Love Food Dehydrators!

I love my food dehydrator. If you’ve ever used food dehydrators to dry food I’m sure you love yours too. You already know how easy they make preserving food and how well they work. If you’ve never used one before, let me give you some reasons why this is a great way to take care of all those tomatoes and other veggies that are mass producing in your garden right now!

Easy

The best part of food dehydrators to me is how easy they are to use. Some produce requires a small amount of prep work, but for the most part all you need to do is to slice your produce, place it on the dehydrator rack and turn it on. Check back later and see how its doing. No standing over a hot stove blanching or canning.

Fast

Fast is a relative term, a dehydrator does take time to dry food but with a fan and even heat it works a lot faster than drying food in the oven. It also doesn’t tie up your oven for hours or even days at a time. Being a small, self-contained unit it also doesn’t heat up your kitchen on hot days either.

Works While I Sleep

Food dehydrators work while you sleep. Lovely. It is truly a set and forget appliance. I can put a batch of tomatoes in before I go to bed and wake up the next morning to find them dried and ready for my pantry. Some dehydrators come with timers so you can set them for a preset period of time. If yours doesn’t have one, you can buy a small appliance timer and use that just as easily to set your dehydrator to run for a certain amount of time.

Preserves Flavor and Nutrients

I have found that food that I dry retains more of its flavor than food that I can or freeze. The drying seems to lock that flavor in instead of changing it the way canning and freezing do.

Stock Your Pantry

Food dehydrators make it easy to stock your pantry. Dried food takes up much less space than canned and are more versatile. A dried apple ring can be a snack all by itself, an addition to morning oatmeal, instant applesauce or part of a casserole.

Canning has its points, but until it can be set to work without constant supervision, heat, mess and just plain hard work food dehydrators win hands down for ease and convenience in my kitchen!