This Lady has Some Skills

[inspecting1]

First off made you look . This was a very intersting view.

[Guest Revelator]

Food production and storage has officially overtaken guns and ammo as my main survival area of interest. I'd get a dehydrator but they're electric. I want to learn a system to dry out food that doesn't depend on the grid. I've been reading up on old-fashioned sun drying, think I'll try that this summer with fruits and meats.

[inspecting1]

Plexiglass box with a couple vents with real fine screen to keep out the bugs

[JAB]

I want to learn a system to dry out food that doesn't depend on the grid. I've been reading up on old-fashioned sun drying, think I'll try that this summer with fruits and meats.

My wife got me an electric dehydrator for Christmas - I wanted one because of the 'quicker and easier' factor. Year before last, however, we dried a bunch of apples using the sun drying method (it was a joint effort between myself and my grandfather in law, who had done such things, before.) We just put two sawhorses where they would be in full sun for as much of the day as possible. I think that putting them where they can get a little breeze (for the convection effect) speeds things up but I can't prove that. Then we laid a piece of plywood across the sawhorses and covered that with a cloth tarp. We then took the peeled and sliced apples and spread them out in a single layer over the tarp and then covered the apples with some kind of 'mesh' cloth that my grandfather in law had in order to keep the bugs off (wasn't cheesecloth - this was tougher, but similar and cheesecloth would work.) The tarp probably wasn't 100% necessary but it gave a way to cover the apples at night by folding the loose edges of the tarp over (to help keep moisture from the night air off of them) as well as a way to quickly bundle them up to take inside in case it looked like rain. They dried really well. We put them into Ziploc-type freezer bags and put them in the freezer to help them keep even longer. We still have some in the freezer, now (which is part of the reason I didn't dry any last year.) I have heard of folks using a screen in a wooden frame to lay things on to dry in the sun, too. Heck, my great-grandmother used to lay sliced apples out on dish towels in the back window of her car with the windows left slightly cracked. That's how she dried apples for years (side effect was that the interior of her car always smelled like apples - even in the winter when she wasn't drying any.)

Some things (such as cayenne peppers) can be easily dried just by stringing them and hanging them in a relatively dry place. I've been doing that since I was a kid - just use a regular needle and sewing thread and run the needle (and thread) through the cap end of the peppers then hang them to dry in a corner of the kitchen, etc. that is away from the worst of the moisture (as in steam from the stove or sink, etc.) I have heard that many old timers used to do some types of green beans the same way - they called them 'leather britches', I think because of the texture of the hulls once they dried.

I made some home-made chipoltes year before last, too. In fact, I had a bumper crop of all my peppers that year and I smoke/dried some serannos, habaneros and large, red chiles in addition to the jalapenos. Just got some of those disposable mesh things that are made for grilling veggies, etc. on a grill, made a small slit or two in the peppers or simply cut the cap end off of them (to let the moisture out and help speed drying) then got a small fire going in my offset smoker. Kept the vent closed to keep the fire low and put a small block of wood under the lid of the cooking area to let moisture out. It worked really well. I also bagged those and put them in the freezer - and still have a few left (good thing because my peppers didn't do worth a hoot last year.) I just take out ever how many of whichever variety I want (usually a mix), toss them in a hand chopper and pulverise them, toss in a few other spices and pulverize some more and end up with home-made, smoked chili powder. I smoke-dried a few tomatoes at the same time, just as a proof of concept.

After my wife got me the dehydrator for Christmas, I did sort of the same thing with some beef jerky as I did with those peppers but only dried the jerky part way in the smoker then finished it off in the dehydrator just to speed teh process. Benefits there were that I got the smoke flavor on the jerky and the marinade mostly dried in the smoker (meaning less mess to clean up in the electric dehydrator.) It certainly would have worked to simply have done 100% of the drying on the smoker, though. I think smoke drying or similar would be the method I would prefer to use with things that could spoil as quickly as meat but that is just my preference. Next thing I want along those lines is an inexpensive vacuum-sealer. I figure that, with most things, drying then vacuum sealing them will help them keep even longer.

P.S. speaking of tomatoes on the smoker, I also put a bunch of tomatoes on the smoker and let them sit just until the skins started to split and could be peeled off (instead of boiling them for the same results) then made and canned some tomato sauce out of those. The sauce kept a nice amount of the smoky flavor and, except for the fact that I should have cooked the sauce down more before jarring it up (it was a little on the thin side) that was one of the best ideas I have had - very flavorful results. Almost makes me wish I had smoked the habaneros I used to make my home-made habanero sauce - or at least some of them.

There is a book called 'Stocking Up' that describes all sorts of methods of food preservation, etc. I don't know where the heck my copy has gotten to but now that I think of it, I need to find it. I have just barely scratched the surface of doing this type of thing and need to learn/do more.

http://www.tldm.org/tldmstore/StockingUp3.htm

Edited April 9, 2010 by JAB