Freeze Dryers and Freeze Dried Food (Part 1)

[richichi]

I apologize if I have missed it, but I am interested to see how a custard would work in one. I have always wanted to try a powdered creme brulee for example.

[Deryn]

I think it should work fine since cream (and eggs) can be FD'd nicely. If Kerry doesn't try that out, Richichi, I will make some and FD it in a week or so when I get mine transported and set up. Can make the brulee part separately and just powder it without FD'ing I imagine.

[Kerry Beal]

The sugar might be an issue - bet creme caramel would work better - or just FD the custard part and make a sugar powder to put on top with the silicone in the oven technique.

[richichi]

Man I wish I had the money for one of these. I want fun toys! Thanks Deryn and Kerry.

[yesterdays]

We love our freeze dryer! It is amazing how many ways you can use it. I haven't noticed any posts about freeze drying raw meat so I thought I would chime in. I'll add some pictures. So far, I have freeze dried raw pork loin chops, raw chicken breasts and NY Strip. I buy whole loins and NY strip then cut and trim. The pics are of small portion size cuts, you can do larger cuts as well.

 

The raw meats rehydrate in water to be exactly like fresh. I used a tenderizer on the steak before freeze drying and it grilled to as tender as the best filet. The only difference in rehydrating is that I soak the pork and chicken in water, but with beef I use very little water so I don't lose its natural juices in the rehydrating process. Beef takes up water quicker than the pork and chicken too (about 10 minutes to rehydrate completely).

 

Also, for those who soak venison, freeze drying it then rehydrating in milk greatly lessens the "gamey" flavor... use water if you prefer the strong game flavor. 

 

Pork loin dry:

 

same pork Loin rehydrated and on a griddle:

 

Same pork loin... This was our first test; it had the same taste texture and cooked just like any loin chop...

 

These are small cuts of New York Strip dried and in a Ziplock (We sealed it w/o2 absorbers in mylar later...

 

These are a couple of odd cuts of the NY Strip that we rehydrated (we use a ziplock with just a little water, then add more water if needed... I didn't take a photo of them cooking... but the were cooked to medium and medium well and were amazing! I could have used even less water as beef soaks up water very well.

 

I love seeing what others have done with their freeze dryers... Thanks to the sweet lady on the other board who recommended checking this site out.

[Shalmanese]

Have you tried drying meat and then rehydrating in a marinade? Do you get greater penetration of flavors this way than a conventional marinade?

Also, I'm really curious why freeze drying raw meat hydrates easily while freezer burned raw meat is extremely difficult to rehydrate. Seems like both work on similar principles.

[Deryn]

Welcome to eGullet, yesterdays! And thank you so much for such a wonderful first post, complete with great pictures too. Your tips for tenderizing, rehydrating in milk or water, etc. are invaluable as well.

Shalmanese, I suspect that has something to do with cell damage caused by the lengthy time it took to freezer burn versus freeze drying which is done quickly and in a controlled manner.

Edited November 23, 2014 by Deryn (log)

[MelissaH]

Has anyone tried freeze-drying canned pumpkin yet? I'd be interested to know how much mass gets lost during the process. (I'm trying to reverse-engineer a pumpkin bread mix, and wonder how much of the water that gets added is just to replace the moisture originally in the "pumpkin flakes" listed on the ingredients.

[Kerry Beal]

I would - but I'm not a fan of pumpkin.   Bet it would be similar to mashed potatoes though.  So 70 grams of mashed potatoes with 250 ml of water gives you back the initial mashed texture.

[yesterdays]

When rehydrating freeze dried raw meat in marinade use water and a little (very little) of whatever you want to marinade with, The meat soaks up the flavors when rehydrating much more intensely than if you marinade after rehydrating (so be conservative). It could be an unusual method of creating intensely seasoned beef or chicken jerky too (I can't stand jerky). If you freeze dry, marinade then dehydrate strips to jerky.... I would think it was terrible, but jerky people would have a hard time figuring out how on earth you did it. Smokey chicken jerky with intense apple flavor might be well received (just a thought) I would likely add a drop of liquid smoke and apple cider,  then cut into jerky strips after rehydrating, then place at the highest setting in an excalibur.... sadly Someone else would have to taste test it... LOL, did I mention that I really dislike jerky..   I may try some to put in Christmas baskets... I'll let you know what the taste testers say...

[yesterdays]

I am now craving freeze dried gummies, spiders and Jello! LOL... I don't even like them normally, but they just look yummy. How on earth can I look at all this great food and crave the gummy bears and jello... Go figure. I think this darn machine is so exciting that it's thrown me into a second childhood or something! So many wonderful new things to try! Guess I'm not "All Growed Up" after all. 

 

Can't wait to see all the wonderful creations as folks continue to share them. Thanks for sharing your adventures in freeze drying everyone. I'll try to post more pics in a couple of weeks. Time to get into Thanksgiving plans, and Christmas decorating, so I may avoid freeze drying this week, or maybe not.. we'll see

[Deryn]

If you are interested in an HR FD, you may want to check HR's site this week. Black Friday sale. Seem to be quite substantial savings.

[dbinokc]

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.

Edited November 25, 2014 by dbinokc (log)

[Deryn]

Perhaps draining the sour cream first (cheesecloth over a bowl for a few hours) might help make it thick enough on its own (and probably would even help reduce the freeze drying time a bit too). Alternatively perhaps you can find some sour cream with a gelatin or cornstarch additive - seems a lot of the cheaper varieties may contain some these days - and try that too?

Freezing any dairy product can leave some grainy-ness I know. The fact that we freeze fairly fast when freeze-drying I think may actually help to reduce the grainy-ness issue to some extent as well but I hope to experiment soon with cream cheese and sour cream freeze-dried and reconstituted to make cheesecake. There is or was recently another topic talking about the grainy-ness induced in cheesecake when made with pre-frozen dairy items I believe.

[Tango Charlie]

I big thanks to Kerry Beal, I just bought one of HR's units and had a million questions and you have answered most of them already here on this forum.

 

Thank you!

[Kerry Beal]

Welcome Tango Chariie - don't hesitate to ask if you come up with more questions.

 

Cracked open Freeze Girl this morning with the following -

 

 

Mashed potatoes

 

 

Pineapple

 

 

Green beans and dill pickles

 

 

The gummy bears that tried to eat Freeze Girl - these suckers expand!

 

 

[Anna N]

Kerry brought some of the green beans and some of the gummy bears to my house this morning. If I don't stop eating gummy bears I am going to have a sugar crisis. As a snack the green beans need some seasoning. Have not yet decided what that might be.

[natasha1270]

Have you had green bean chips before? I wonder if they are freeze-dried and then the oil is just a coating or if they are fried, too. They are so addictive.

 

eta. ingredients for creative snacks green bean chips: green beans, canola oil, dextrin & sea salt.

Edited November 27, 2014 by natasha1270 (log)

[Kerry Beal]

Have you had green bean chips before? I wonder if they are freeze-dried and then the oil is just a coating or if they are fried, too. They are so addictive.

 

eta. ingredients for creative snacks green bean chips: green beans, canola oil, dextrin & sea salt.

Sounds like they are vacuum fried.  And apparently that means fried under vacuum - requiring less heat.

[Anna N]

Tried tossing some of the green beans with a little olive oil and some Trader J's 21 Seasoning Salute but the olive oil was overpowering.

[Tango Charlie]

I have a question, with things like FD cheese. Do you rehydrate in some water and scoop it out? Or is it something that you just sprinkle over a baked potato and let steam do the work or whatever it is you add it to?

Edited November 27, 2014 by Tango Charlie (log)

[Kerry Beal]

If I need the cheese to go in the oven and melt - I rehydrate - if not I sprinkle. So on cream soup I sprinkle.

[MelissaH]

Could you pre-salt the green beans before they're dried, or does the salt not stick through the process?

[Shalmanese]

Do you typically have to blanch vegetables before freeze drying? If so, you could blanch the green beans in heavily salted water.

[dbinokc]

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.

Edited November 27, 2014 by dbinokc (log)