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Is there be anything non-chocolate that could coat something freeze dried and keep it from absorbing moisture.

Kerry, After you dip freeze dried food into chocolate, do they stay crunchy or go soft. If they go soft, do you need to keep them refrigerated so they do not spoil?

When I seal my jars I leave the rings on, but loosen them about an 1/8 to 1/4 turn to allow the lid to let the air out. I also have to leave the rings on because when I seal in my chamber vac, the quart jars have to lay on their side. Whenever I reseal a jar, I make sure there are no particles on the lip or lid. The only time I have had a vacuum failure was due to the jar having a crack.

This is how I decide what sealing method to use. Items I use frequently just keep in a non vacuum sealed mason jar. The most important thing is just to keep the food from absorbing moisture. Items I use infrequently or within 12 months I vacuum seal the mason jar. That keeps out the moisture and minimizes any oxidation. If I was planning to keep items for a longer term, them I would consider mylar with oxygen absorbers. So far I have not done any mylar storage. Everything I have done gets used too fast! Another option is a chamber vac with nitrogen backfill. I would love to get one of these, but I have no place I could put one or the tank.

There are various conversion calculators out there that can give you this value. A quick search shows that 1000 millitorr is about .04 inches are mercury. Putting that into terms of bigger numbers being a larger vacuum would be in the 29.8 inch range. One atmosphere is 29.92 inches mercury. Essentially the HR machine pulls a much better vacuum than my chamber vac and leaves the Foodsaver in the dust.

Peggy, Sorry to hear about the damage to the freeze dryer. It must be really frustrating, especially with Christmas approaching. HR boxes them very well. It must have taken a good fall or been run through with a forklift to damage it.

I have not used any oxygen absorbers in mine. I use my chamber vac to seal my jars. There is a picture of that somewhere earlier in this thread. Most of my dehydrating is centered around things like fruits, that I do not use fast enough before they spoil. Nothing really stays stored very long before it gets used. I have done a few raw burger patties. One I cooked right away and it was fine. The other I vacuumed sealed for week before trying. It took a little longer absorb water because of the meat getting compressed. Still it cooked okay. I also did a slice of cooked pork as a test. That did turn out to be a bit tough. I probably will not try pork again. I have to also add I am glad Kerry started this thread. I do not think HR will get around to starting a forum on their own. It is nice to be able to share experiences with other freeze dryer owners.

BGW, I currently store all the food I dry in quart and pint size jars. The only vacuum failure I had was due to a jar that had a crack in it. Beyond that I just make sure the lids and lip of the jar are clean and free of any debris. And inspect your jar for cracks before using.

Were the mashed potatoes made from fresh potatoes or from instant? I have thought about freeze drying mashed potatoes, but freeze drying it from instant would not seem to provide any advantages.

I freeze dried my first batch of sour cream. Overall I like the results, but as others had mentioned it loses some of its thickness. I am wondering if adding something like cornstarch, gelatin or something else could be added to get the consistency back. I did also notice that the sour cream is a little grainy with hand mixing, but using my hand blender smoothed it out.

Kerry, I have had the same problem with needing to reseat the seal on mine after a stop. Fortunately I was there or the machine would have been sucking air and blowing oil all day. All the more reason HR should update their firmware to automatically turn off the vacuum pump if it can't get below 1000 milliTor in a certain amount of time. Anymore I keep my vacuum pump turned off and turn it on manually to be sure a vacuum is getting pulled. How did you like the freeze dried raspberries. I did a 4 pound frozen bag from Sams, but they were too strong and bitter for my tastes. How does the freeze dried milk reconstitute compared to fresh.

Kerry, I will be interested in how the rice/peas/meat works. Just curious, do you use any seasonings/spices with that mix? I am not much of an expert when it comes to seasoning things well.

A few more items you might add to the list. 1. Make sure drain valve is open when the unit is finally turned off. Somehow I actually managed to do this one. Ended with water all over the floor! 2. Make sure drain bucket is empty of water. I read elsewhere where someone had manged to fill up the drain bucket enough to submerge the drain tube. When they opened up drain valve to release the vacuum, water was sucked up into the chamber and making a big mess and soaking the food. I have not done this one yet, but give me time. 3.Make sure drain tube is in the bucket! Done this one, but caught it before I had as big a mess as in 1.

I do the same cup trick on mine as well. That works ok for some mild sptting, but not today.

This is a question to Harvest Right. Is there a timeout somewhere so if a vacuum is not achieved withing a certain amount of time, then shut off the vacuum pump. I ran into a situation today where I forgot to close the drain valve after a restart. An hour or so later I noticed this haze in the house. I checked the FD and sure enough it was blowing an oil mist all over. I had just refilled the oil and I am guessing it blew about a quarter of its oil out. If I had not been home, it could have blown out all the oil from the pump and damaged it. I would even say there is a potential for a fire in this type of situation. If there is not a vacuum timeout feature, then I think one should be added. I would not think it would be too hard to add a check to the firmware to turn off the vacuum pump if some amount of vacuum is not pulled in a certain amount of time.