History of Dehydration Foods

HISTORY OF DEHYDRATED FOODS wooden pallets or stacks of trays filled with food, with a draft system built into it to circulate the hot air. Today, the newer Natural Draft dehydrators use a 1,000-watt element for heating as its heat source, or with the electric dehydrator using nine 75-watt bulbs totaling 675-watts, plus an electric fan. TYPES OF FOODS TO BE DEHYDRATED Solar dehydration or oven dehydration are good methods for meats, vegetables and fruits. If an oven is used, make sure there are numerous drying trays to fit on the oven's racks, an accurate oven thermometer, and a small fan that is electric. The oven temperature should be 140 -degrees for up to eight hours for vegetables, fruit from four to five hours, and five hours for jerky. The 140-degrees oven heat is approximately the same heat as keeping the pilot light on, with scorching occurring if longer drying times are used.If freezing is used afterwards to kill possible insect life on the sun-dried foods, dry packing in moisture proof containers can be used. The freezer temperature needs to be below 0-degrees. Fruit: Meat: Many different foods are prepared by dehydration. Good examples are meat such as prosciutto (a.k.a. Parma ham), bresaola, and beef jerky. Fruits change character completely when dried: the plum becomes a prune), the grape a raisin; figs and dates are also transformed. Drying is rarely used for vegetables as it removes the vitamins within them, however bulbs, such as garlic and onion, are often dried. Also chilis are frequently dried. For centuries, much of the European diet depended on dried cod, known as salt cod or bacalhau (with salt) or stockfish (without). It formed the main protein source for the slaves on the West Indian plantations and was a major economic force within the triangular trade. The Process Drying methods Foods can be dehydrated by various means: the sun, a conventional oven, an electric dehydrator or a microwave oven (for herbs only). Drying, like other