dehydrator- preserving the harvest

[finallygettingit]

did you have a good year for fruit?
my freezer is full, I have made tons of jam and now I have kilos of apples,,,
can anyone recommend a large capacity deydrator, preferable one that doesnt cost 1000s. I did dry some pears in the oven but it seems a very wasteful way to do it...

Can’t recommend one as the one I bought was from Lakeland and looks like they don’t sell it anymore. The units can be quite big so do need consider storage.
get one with at least 4 or 5 stackable trays and get a mandolin so things are sliced evenly. Keep rotating the trays and turn things over every now and then. Store in jam jars/ Kilner jars. If you watch you tube there is whole word out there that preserve and then rehydrate - tend to be American homesteaders.

What I have tried and worked=
Apples
Pears with a brush of honey
Chillis ( don’t cross contaminate as the apple batch I had had a chilli extra)
Bananas ( the favourite)
strawberries ( must be thinly sliced)
pinapple

what has not worked
grapes
blueberries
blackberries
gooseberries

Not tried veg as tend to freeze them, fruits can be eaten as snacks…. Rather quickly….

I tried using the ‘dehydrate’ setting on my air fryer. After about 20 hours (on and off), my plum halves still weren’t fully dehydrated!

@finallygettingit If you didn’t want to invest in a dehydrator and the electricity costs, you could also safely ‘water bath can’ your apples.

If you like fruit leathers I'd recommend getting a square/rectangular one, as I've got a round one and it's a faff to make them with the hole in the middle of the trays.

I put apples in mine overnight last night.

thanks everyone
I have made fruit leathers but then didn't eat them 😂would be different if I still had DC
good tip about the mandoline, thanks
I'm guessing the water bath method is what I know as bottling, which I found a bit of a faff.

The electricity id not a big deal as luckily we have got solar panels !

I bought this as it was highly recommended the the US community - https://www.rawliving.co.uk/products/excalibur-9-tray-dehydrator-with-timer-black?variant=51626150297983&country=GB&currency=GBP&utm_medium=product_sync&utm_source=google&utm_content=sag_organic&utm_campaign=sag_organic I know it's a bit pricey, but it works very well. Uses very little electric and I do it overnight on Economy 7. It's worth it if you'll have a lot to do year on year.

oooh thank you, that does look like it has a large capacity too

Interesting that your blueberries didn't work. What went wrong? Mine were slow but did dry nicely.

Raspberries were the one that surprised me. I first did some just as an experiment to fill a part tray of something else. I fully expected them to just go mushy but they were perfect - at least as good as commercial freeze dried ones.

Apple butter made in a slow cooker works well for preserving.