We have put a bit of cinnamon on some of our apple slices in past batches. They are good, but I could go either way with them. Pears, on the other-hand, are a must for cinnamon! We did these 2 1/2 years ago. Freeze drying pear slices with cinnamon ruclips.net/video/BSssU5n3GA0/видео.html
@@lindapeterson3483 Thanks for watching, and thanks for mentioning sprinkling cinnamon on the apples. I had completely forgotten to suggest adding cinnamon, so I pinned your comment.
Thanks so much for watching and commenting. The last of this years apples are going into the freeze dryer tomorrow or the next day. We did mostly little cubes with cinnamon this year. (Bought a new cutter to make the slices into cubes)
Thank you for making your videos. I just found your channel today, and have already learned a lot! I was searching for how to stop the condensation from dripping down the HR door, and saw you make your insulation ring around the seal. Awesome!! We may make one. Thanks again!
Thanks for watching and for commenting! And don't forget the door disc. 😁 Making an Acrylic Disc Front for a Harvest Right Freeze Dryer ruclips.net/video/erH1VDqNi80/видео.html The door on my sister's new machine drips (a lot!) due to the condensation, and leaves puddles; unacceptable! If your machine is a new one like my sister's then it's going to be a little different than what I did for mine, because of space. We are working or adding these things to her machine and will be posting about in the near future. I had forgotten how much condensation happens on the cold fronts of the freeze dryers. It's absurd! I didn't put up with it with mine.
As usual!! You still impressed me! Wish we had orchards like that here in Colorado. At least winter is coming and that will free up a lot of my time to do more FD ing. Again Thank You for sharing!
The u-pick orchard changed my favorite apple. I used to hate Golden Delicious apples until I picked them myself. Now Golden Delicious is my favorite apple for drying, apple sauce, pies, almost everything. But they don't keep long; you pretty much can't get a good one at the store. And with CA storage, a lot of apples at the store may not even be from the same year they were grown.
@@SchoolReports The sad thing is. As I'm part owner of a wholesale nursery selling trees and shrubs some fruits. But the growing season here in CO. is so sporadic. We get a late frost in the spring no fruit. 😤😥
@@dsboutdoors7301 We have been there! No fruit some years due to warm February then freezing April. Then we have to go the the U-Pick which is only 800 ft lower.
How did you determine these apples were dry? You didn’t weigh them on camera? Thanks so much for these wonderful videos. I appreciate the way you explain everything.
The older videos? 🤣 I have to apologize for many of my older videos. Even I hate to look at them! They may be okay if you already know about freeze drying. In my focus to keep them very short, most of my older, shorter videos are almost devoid of information! I tried hard to keep the videos down to 10 to 15 minutes, no matter what I had to cut out! I had just assumed that people watching them would already know about freeze drying, and had watched all my earlier videos leading up to each one, and therefore, they would make sense. Oops! Then I found out that half the viewers of each video have never seen any of my videos before and a large number had never even seen any freeze drying video before. That's when I switched to the longer format with the (somewhat) more repetitive content. (April 23rd, 2022 when I started my "100 Days: The First 50 Batches - Freeze Drying 500 lbs of Food" series:) 😁 I just had to realize that people know how to skip ahead!
Something to try, when first opening the drain valve to relieve the vacuum, is to just barely crack the valve open so that the chamber fills very slowly. This is sort of frustratingly slow, but it seems like it's easier on everything. It may be entirely coincidental, but I find that my vacuum pump oil is always pristine with none of the discoloration or particulate contamination that others describe, even after long use. I figure any particles, ice, or liquid water that may be lurking near the vacuum pump exit opening in the chamber, or anywhere in the chamber won't be as likely to be swept up and get drawn into the pump or it's tubing. And flexing of the chamber and the various seals such as the wiring feed-through may be lessened by reducing the sudden shock of opening the drain valve rapidly. And I don't risk nasty old chunkage that's formed in the drain tube or valve area being sucked back into the chamber or onto the food in the finished batch. I do get impatient waiting for the door to pop open, but I think venting the chamber slowly seems prudent.
The biggest difference I've seen is that the new vacuum pumps are *WAY* better than the older vacuum pumps like I have. (and that other people who have described the issue of dirty oil probably have) The new pumps just stay clean! My sister has done more than 30 batches before draining the oil, and oil still comes as clean as when it went in. Cleaner then my machine's oil after a single batch. I clean my drain tube so I don't have stuff in there. Very good points about the thermal and pressure expansion and contractions of the components.
@@SchoolReports Yes. Mine has the newer "premium oil" vacuum pump, so perhaps it's the pump that makes such a big difference. The machine pops up with a reminder to change the pump oil every so often, and I do drain it and filter it and so far, have just added new oil each time. But I'm saving the filtered oil, and I suspect it will run just fine when I do start using it. HR's newer software versions also provide a bit of protection for the vacuum pumps, too. After the freeze cycle, the system initiates the "vacuum freezing" mode for a while. It turns on the pump and keeps the shelf heaters off. It looks at the chamber pressure and if the pressure doesn't drop far enough in a reasonable amount of time, it switches the vacuum pump off again and adds some extra freeze time. Then it tries the vacuum freeze mode again. It'll try this three times before giving up with a vacuum error. That helps make sure that the food is thoroughly frozen which protects the pump from sucking up a lot of water vapor in case unfrozen food boils when the vacuum is applied. That supposedly prolongs the life of the pump. It probably keeps the oil in a better condition, too.
I've yet to have a batch of apple slices last more than 2 months before getting soft and ruined. I've read thin slices and no skin is the fix....but you have left the skins on. Have you found those apple slices are lasting for years, or not? Thanks!
We almost always leave the peel on, unless we know the batch is planned for rehydrating for making apple pie or other filling. We have had no issues with the apple getting soft. - That should not happen. It is harder to freeze dry the thicker slices be cause it will take exponentially longer to dry as the thickness increases. Where a 1/8" slice may take X amount of time to dry, a 1/4" slice may take 4X to dry. Maybe they weren't 100% dry; either that or the bags are not good enough and they are allowing moisture to get through. I did have that happen once. The Freeze Dry Video I Never Wanted to Make - ruclips.net/video/B0KUfoHuCk4/видео.htmlsi=NTYtPQpPZBPhiVhe Here is a couple minutes of us opening a bag of 1/2" slices that were 7 years old. They were perfect! (I guess I should make a short video of the apple for this channel, or include a clip in the upcoming apple video) Finding Sunstones & Using Our Freeze Dried Food - ruclips.net/video/VMhcG7_ilHE/видео.htmlsi=GHRyMRwMA9fGW4nE&t=738
@@SchoolReports thanks! We used the HR brand of bags, but all my slices were thick. I've seen others struggle with thin slices tho, and had read the skin could be the culprit. Thanks for the response and videos!
@@T4nkcommander The HR bags we've used were great, but we've been very happy with the ones we've been using after we ran out of the HR bags. We still have a few bags of food in the HR bags, including more apple slices. In the oxygen absorber test video from a few days ago there is another bag of apples in a HR bag. The video was about the 7 year old OA so I didn't think to talk about the apples slices! (Unpeeled and prefect) Skins are not a problem. Peeling them before freeze drying is something we just didn't do until after making a pie with rehydrated apples that still had the peel. It's just wrong to have peel in the pie. 🤣 Rehydrating Freeze Dried Apples & Making Apple Pie - ruclips.net/video/02Z-LHuwqTY/видео.htmlsi=jyBTg40tYGZB__7F&t=67
What type of laser did you use for the apples? That was brilliant and would decrease headaches for me. I also appreciate how you use silicone mats and baking trays to prefreeze before storing in ziploc bags. I have a large freeze dryer and three quart sized ziplocks fill one tray. However, the product tends to freeze into a block and dry slower. Your method would solve that dilemma for me as well. Enjoying your channel. Thank you for sharing with us.
Having the "Laser guided apple peeler" made it so much easier to get the apple aligned right. What I used this time was an Infrared Thermometer with Laser that I already had. I'll show it in a video about the peeler in a few days. (There are good enough ones for as low as $20) But, before next years apples, I will probably buy a laser pointer. Either a Presentation laser pointer or just a cat toy pointer. As long as the laser switch can be locked on and is either rechargeable or uses batteries that are NOT the little button cell ones. If you pat the apple slices dry a bit before putting them on the baking trays it works a lot better. I forgot until I went to take them out of the pans.
I own a FD too. I came looking to see how others loaded the trays because my two layer trays were so inefficient. TY I have two big baking sheets in the freezer loaded w/chopped apples waiting to go into the machine today.
Right on! (About avoiding anything that uses a stack of the little "hearing aid" type batteries.) I found a nice little laser pointer that uses two AAA cells. I usually prefer AAs over AAAs because they cost exactly the same and have around double the amp-hour rating, but compared to those tiny little hearing aid type cells, even the AAAs are vastly superior. I'm going to have to try your laser alignment trick for the peeler, for sure! Thanks for the informative videos!
I can (and have) made a really good apple pie jam (chock full of chopped apple bits), but I don't make apple jelly, because I _hate_ jelly! Other people can make the jelly. Jam good, jelly bad! 🤣
Dry apples are so good! I pack up to 8 lbs onto the 4 trays. I may have gone a bit overboard with the citric and ascorbic mixture. The state extension services sites I looked at said to use 1 teaspoon ascorbic acid powder per gallon of water and I used 1 1/2 teaspoons each, citric and ascorbic acid powder in just 3 quarts. It still seemed okay.
Question, just got my 2022 HR, with the lastest software updated. I've had trouble doing pre frozen apple slices for some reason. I continually get a vacuum error on the freezing cycle. I've done trays of prefrozen tomato sauce, no issue. But something about the apples, it just freaks out. Any thoughts/advice? Thanks, love your channel and that you're so willing to share your knowledge!!! Game changer Sir!
I hate to say it this way, but, what an intriguing problem! I've been trying to think this through without being able to see it or try it. I don't think anything like this has happened with mine yet. This is the only thing that I've been able to come up with so far: Could the apples be very ripe and sweet (and therefore more sugary) and in need of a colder temperature, like ice cream (because the sugars cause it to have a lower freezing point), before starting the vacuum? If it still isn't completely frozen it would sublimate off a LOT of moisture too quickly and overwhelm the system. Sorry, right now that's all I have without doing it myself. If I think of anything else I'll come back here and add it. Every one else out there. - Has this ever happened to you? What did you figure out?
@@SchoolReports they didn't taste additionally sweet to me. I am sending my logs to them tomorrow, so hopefully it'll show up and we can have a community ahh ha moment. I will definitely keep you in the loop!
Thanks so much for sharing! It would be fascinating to understand those results. (Maybe less fascinating and more frustrating when it's happening to you and not someone else) 😁
@@SchoolReports update finally!!!! Turns out that my software version was a "u" and needed to be a "v" for the pump I have. So far I've dried 4 dz eggs and some tomato sauce. I will be trying apples again in the near future!
I'm not sure I understand your question, I hope this answers it. The long term problem is gas permeability - oxygen is going to be going through the bag, slowly, forever. The better the bag the slower it happens. If you have oxygen absorbers in the bag they keep absorbing any oxygen that comes through.
It does work well for bagging. We "adjusted" a scoop we found on Amazon. This is the video of how we made it - Food Scoop For Freeze Dryer Tray ruclips.net/video/trs26E42Zho/видео.html and this is an Amazon affiliate link to the scoop I used for the scoop project: amzn.to/3pdTB4J
I stack mine and have had no problems at all. It takes a little time to separate them without breaking them. I cut mine into half rings. Hope this helps
The food is not dry if it's still cold. This doesn't work as well with loose things like apple slices, but it's my habit. The tray temperature is set for 115f for the apples. The thermometers are not really necessary, I just don't like to have to open the machine to check the food, and if it's not dry, add time. If it's not warm it's not done and I can add time well it's still running. Using this video for an example - ruclips.net/video/wn6v_9M905E/видео.html I was looking to make sure all the thermometers get up to the temperature that the trays are set at, for at least a couple hours. I had the tray temp set for 110f for the milk. The bottom tray had been over 110f until the tray heaters turn off during the last 15 minutes of the final dry cycle. (it shows a lower temp in the video)
(Feeding the algorithm with another response here.😇) We don't usually rehydrate our apple slices, we just eat them dry. Love them! After getting your question, I did a little test with 2 slices of the freeze dried apples. (I'll post a photo on the channel Community page) I took two small bowls of water and put a slice of apple in each. In one bowl I added some citric acid and ascorbic acid and the other is just plain water. Surprise! The slice that's in just plan water started to turned brown in just seconds. (Okay the seconds may have been more than 60, but it was quick.) I had thought that the fact that I had dipped them in citric acid and ascorbic acid water before freeze drying would have been enough. It's not.
During my drying cycles my new Medium dryer never gets above 10 degrees - any recommendations ? it’s a brand new med HR- when i tested the drying the heat worked- and mtorr are 51
I'll put this here too, because someone else might see it and be able to help. I've never had this issue so I'm just going to be guessing a bit, but here goes:) So you already know, from your heat test, that the heaters can heat up, now the question is why aren't they heating up when you run a batch. Or, are they heating up and the display is lying. Where I'd start: Is the machine freeze drying? Is ice forming on the chamber walls? By any chance is the dry temperature turned way down in the custom settings? (I don't know if the new machines can go that low. Mine can, but my sister's machine is in use so I can't check it right now) I would start by checking the 'Tray Temperature' settings. Next, I'd check the actual temperature by putting a thermometer in the machine, on one of the trays or in the food. This would check to see if the display temperature is working or if it's lying and it really is heating. (Software vs hardware?)
i got thermometer like yours so i’ll put in food and check all your suggestions! you responded so quick thanks. i’m using all your methods of weighing several times , wrapping my opening etc. i learn so much from you! thanks
@@kpowers9002 I hope we can troubleshoot this and make it go. 🤣I would love to drive around the country (in a mini van camper conversion packed full of freeze dried food!) to help people to figure out their Freeze Dryer issues. (and make videos of it) 🤣 I know that most people hate it, but I love troubleshooting. But it's harder to do remotely.
The 'best' in what sense? The thickness of each individual piece of food, or the thickness of the food on the tray? It's mostly about the trade-off of time vs amount you can dry in a batch. Bigger pieces and/or more on a tray will be slower. Also, the rehydration time is much longer if the pieces are bigger. Consider this: Beef Stew - Homemade vs Mountain House ruclips.net/video/w_p5j5oyX5M/видео.htmlsi=EDnRU4eGT7rKTZNe&t=623
We got ours at Chef'Store. They are Dynamic brand resealable freezer bags. The price was just over 18 cents per bag. I know that Ziploc makes 2 gallon ones also, but I they tend to cost a lot more.
I don't know for that batch because I didn't track most batches. This batch was about 41 hours ruclips.net/video/HShE_KexX90/видео.html This batch was about 39 1/2 hours ruclips.net/video/ueSdOSjXfyM/видео.html This batch was about 43 1/2 hours ruclips.net/video/E0_yOqRIJBU/видео.html
@@vickiebonano2092 The newer machines are faster and the thin apple slices (like in this video) will also dry faster. Plus, if we hadn't stuffed 10 lbs on the trays (like the other videos) it would have been faster too. BTW, I LOVE the thin slices; they're the best!
I like to sprinkle my snacking apples with a little cinnamon before I FD them. They are so delicious!
We have put a bit of cinnamon on some of our apple slices in past batches. They are good, but I could go either way with them. Pears, on the other-hand, are a must for cinnamon! We did these 2 1/2 years ago. Freeze drying pear slices with cinnamon ruclips.net/video/BSssU5n3GA0/видео.html
@@SchoolReports good to know. I have some pears I think I’ll do that with. Thanks for all you do. I really enjoy your channel.
@@lindapeterson3483 Thanks for watching, and thanks for mentioning sprinkling cinnamon on the apples. I had completely forgotten to suggest adding cinnamon, so I pinned your comment.
@@SchoolReports ❤️
We got two five gallon buckets of apples from our neighbor's apple trees. We have great neighbors!
Thank you for sharing all your knowledge and systems. You have so much credibility and I’ve learned so much.
Thanks so much for watching and commenting.
The last of this years apples are going into the freeze dryer tomorrow or the next day. We did mostly little cubes with cinnamon this year. (Bought a new cutter to make the slices into cubes)
Thank you for making your videos. I just found your channel today, and have already learned a lot! I was searching for how to stop the condensation from dripping down the HR door, and saw you make your insulation ring around the seal. Awesome!! We may make one. Thanks again!
Thanks for watching and for commenting!
And don't forget the door disc. 😁 Making an Acrylic Disc Front for a Harvest Right Freeze Dryer ruclips.net/video/erH1VDqNi80/видео.html
The door on my sister's new machine drips (a lot!) due to the condensation, and leaves puddles; unacceptable! If your machine is a new one like my sister's then it's going to be a little different than what I did for mine, because of space. We are working or adding these things to her machine and will be posting about in the near future.
I had forgotten how much condensation happens on the cold fronts of the freeze dryers. It's absurd! I didn't put up with it with mine.
As usual!! You still impressed me! Wish we had orchards like that here in Colorado. At least winter is coming and that will free up a lot of my time to do more FD ing.
Again Thank You for sharing!
The u-pick orchard changed my favorite apple. I used to hate Golden Delicious apples until I picked them myself. Now Golden Delicious is my favorite apple for drying, apple sauce, pies, almost everything. But they don't keep long; you pretty much can't get a good one at the store. And with CA storage, a lot of apples at the store may not even be from the same year they were grown.
@@SchoolReports The sad thing is. As I'm part owner of a wholesale nursery selling trees and shrubs some fruits. But the growing season here in CO. is so sporadic. We get a late frost in the spring no fruit. 😤😥
@@dsboutdoors7301 We have been there! No fruit some years due to warm February then freezing April. Then we have to go the the U-Pick which is only 800 ft lower.
Awesome. Great video. Although I mostly FD other foods, apples are my favorite thing. I love, love love snacking on them. Better than any candy!
How did you determine these apples were dry? You didn’t weigh them on camera? Thanks so much for these wonderful videos. I appreciate the way you explain everything.
The older videos? 🤣 I have to apologize for many of my older videos. Even I hate to look at them! They may be okay if you already know about freeze drying.
In my focus to keep them very short, most of my older, shorter videos are almost devoid of information! I tried hard to keep the videos down to 10 to 15 minutes, no matter what I had to cut out! I had just assumed that people watching them would already know about freeze drying, and had watched all my earlier videos leading up to each one, and therefore, they would make sense. Oops! Then I found out that half the viewers of each video have never seen any of my videos before and a large number had never even seen any freeze drying video before. That's when I switched to the longer format with the (somewhat) more repetitive content. (April 23rd, 2022 when I started my "100 Days: The First 50 Batches - Freeze Drying 500 lbs of Food" series:) 😁 I just had to realize that people know how to skip ahead!
Something to try, when first opening the drain valve to relieve the vacuum, is to just barely crack the valve open so that the chamber fills very slowly.
This is sort of frustratingly slow, but it seems like it's easier on everything.
It may be entirely coincidental, but I find that my vacuum pump oil is always pristine with none of the discoloration or particulate contamination that others describe, even after long use. I figure any particles, ice, or liquid water that may be lurking near the vacuum pump exit opening in the chamber, or anywhere in the chamber won't be as likely to be swept up and get drawn into the pump or it's tubing.
And flexing of the chamber and the various seals such as the wiring feed-through may be lessened by reducing the sudden shock of opening the drain valve rapidly.
And I don't risk nasty old chunkage that's formed in the drain tube or valve area being sucked back into the chamber or onto the food in the finished batch.
I do get impatient waiting for the door to pop open, but I think venting the chamber slowly seems prudent.
The biggest difference I've seen is that the new vacuum pumps are *WAY* better than the older vacuum pumps like I have. (and that other people who have described the issue of dirty oil probably have) The new pumps just stay clean! My sister has done more than 30 batches before draining the oil, and oil still comes as clean as when it went in. Cleaner then my machine's oil after a single batch.
I clean my drain tube so I don't have stuff in there.
Very good points about the thermal and pressure expansion and contractions of the components.
@@SchoolReports Yes. Mine has the newer "premium oil" vacuum pump, so perhaps it's the pump that makes such a big difference. The machine pops up with a reminder to change the pump oil every so often, and I do drain it and filter it and so far, have just added new oil each time. But I'm saving the filtered oil, and I suspect it will run just fine when I do start using it.
HR's newer software versions also provide a bit of protection for the vacuum pumps, too. After the freeze cycle, the system initiates the "vacuum freezing" mode for a while. It turns on the pump and keeps the shelf heaters off. It looks at the chamber pressure and if the pressure doesn't drop far enough in a reasonable amount of time, it switches the vacuum pump off again and adds some extra freeze time. Then it tries the vacuum freeze mode again. It'll try this three times before giving up with a vacuum error.
That helps make sure that the food is thoroughly frozen which protects the pump from sucking up a lot of water vapor in case unfrozen food boils when the vacuum is applied. That supposedly prolongs the life of the pump. It probably keeps the oil in a better condition, too.
I've yet to have a batch of apple slices last more than 2 months before getting soft and ruined. I've read thin slices and no skin is the fix....but you have left the skins on. Have you found those apple slices are lasting for years, or not? Thanks!
We almost always leave the peel on, unless we know the batch is planned for rehydrating for making apple pie or other filling.
We have had no issues with the apple getting soft. - That should not happen. It is harder to freeze dry the thicker slices be cause it will take exponentially longer to dry as the thickness increases. Where a 1/8" slice may take X amount of time to dry, a 1/4" slice may take 4X to dry. Maybe they weren't 100% dry; either that or the bags are not good enough and they are allowing moisture to get through. I did have that happen once. The Freeze Dry Video I Never Wanted to Make - ruclips.net/video/B0KUfoHuCk4/видео.htmlsi=NTYtPQpPZBPhiVhe
Here is a couple minutes of us opening a bag of 1/2" slices that were 7 years old. They were perfect! (I guess I should make a short video of the apple for this channel, or include a clip in the upcoming apple video) Finding Sunstones & Using Our Freeze Dried Food - ruclips.net/video/VMhcG7_ilHE/видео.htmlsi=GHRyMRwMA9fGW4nE&t=738
@@SchoolReports thanks! We used the HR brand of bags, but all my slices were thick. I've seen others struggle with thin slices tho, and had read the skin could be the culprit. Thanks for the response and videos!
@@T4nkcommander The HR bags we've used were great, but we've been very happy with the ones we've been using after we ran out of the HR bags. We still have a few bags of food in the HR bags, including more apple slices. In the oxygen absorber test video from a few days ago there is another bag of apples in a HR bag. The video was about the 7 year old OA so I didn't think to talk about the apples slices! (Unpeeled and prefect) Skins are not a problem. Peeling them before freeze drying is something we just didn't do until after making a pie with rehydrated apples that still had the peel. It's just wrong to have peel in the pie. 🤣
Rehydrating Freeze Dried Apples & Making Apple Pie - ruclips.net/video/02Z-LHuwqTY/видео.htmlsi=jyBTg40tYGZB__7F&t=67
👍👍👍👍👍
What type of laser did you use for the apples? That was brilliant and would decrease headaches for me. I also appreciate how you use silicone mats and baking trays to prefreeze before storing in ziploc bags. I have a large freeze dryer and three quart sized ziplocks fill one tray. However, the product tends to freeze into a block and dry slower. Your method would solve that dilemma for me as well. Enjoying your channel. Thank you for sharing with us.
Having the "Laser guided apple peeler" made it so much easier to get the apple aligned right. What I used this time was an Infrared Thermometer with Laser that I already had. I'll show it in a video about the peeler in a few days. (There are good enough ones for as low as $20) But, before next years apples, I will probably buy a laser pointer. Either a Presentation laser pointer or just a cat toy pointer. As long as the laser switch can be locked on and is either rechargeable or uses batteries that are NOT the little button cell ones.
If you pat the apple slices dry a bit before putting them on the baking trays it works a lot better. I forgot until I went to take them out of the pans.
I own a FD too. I came looking to see how others loaded the trays because my two layer trays were so inefficient. TY I have two big baking sheets in the freezer loaded w/chopped apples waiting to go into the machine today.
Right on! (About avoiding anything that uses a stack of the little "hearing aid" type batteries.)
I found a nice little laser pointer that uses two AAA cells. I usually prefer AAs over AAAs because they cost exactly the same and have around double the amp-hour rating, but compared to those tiny little hearing aid type cells, even the AAAs are vastly superior.
I'm going to have to try your laser alignment trick for the peeler, for sure!
Thanks for the informative videos!
Now you can take the peelings and the Coors and cook them down and make apple jelly as well
I can (and have) made a really good apple pie jam (chock full of chopped apple bits), but I don't make apple jelly, because I _hate_ jelly! Other people can make the jelly. Jam good, jelly bad! 🤣
@@SchoolReports each is own I don't eat apple jelly
What is that lid you are using in place of the pad on the Harvestright?
It's a disc I made; here is the video: Making an Acrylic Disc Front for a Harvest Right Freeze Dryer ruclips.net/video/erH1VDqNi80/видео.html
Sooo... Looks like I can put alot more apples on my trays than what I have been putting. Good tip about the citric mixture...
Dry apples are so good! I pack up to 8 lbs onto the 4 trays. I may have gone a bit overboard with the citric and ascorbic mixture. The state extension services sites I looked at said to use 1 teaspoon ascorbic acid powder per gallon of water and I used 1 1/2 teaspoons each, citric and ascorbic acid powder in just 3 quarts. It still seemed okay.
Question, just got my 2022 HR, with the lastest software updated. I've had trouble doing pre frozen apple slices for some reason. I continually get a vacuum error on the freezing cycle. I've done trays of prefrozen tomato sauce, no issue. But something about the apples, it just freaks out. Any thoughts/advice? Thanks, love your channel and that you're so willing to share your knowledge!!! Game changer Sir!
I hate to say it this way, but, what an intriguing problem! I've been trying to think this through without being able to see it or try it. I don't think anything like this has happened with mine yet.
This is the only thing that I've been able to come up with so far: Could the apples be very ripe and sweet (and therefore more sugary) and in need of a colder temperature, like ice cream (because the sugars cause it to have a lower freezing point), before starting the vacuum? If it still isn't completely frozen it would sublimate off a LOT of moisture too quickly and overwhelm the system. Sorry, right now that's all I have without doing it myself. If I think of anything else I'll come back here and add it.
Every one else out there. - Has this ever happened to you? What did you figure out?
@@SchoolReports they didn't taste additionally sweet to me. I am sending my logs to them tomorrow, so hopefully it'll show up and we can have a community ahh ha moment. I will definitely keep you in the loop!
Thanks so much for sharing! It would be fascinating to understand those results. (Maybe less fascinating and more frustrating when it's happening to you and not someone else) 😁
@@SchoolReports update finally!!!!
Turns out that my software version was a "u" and needed to be a "v" for the pump I have.
So far I've dried 4 dz eggs and some tomato sauce.
I will be trying apples again in the near future!
@@mollyt9714 😁 Good to hear!
do you think an O2 absorber is needed when you have a pressure chamber?
I'm not sure I understand your question, I hope this answers it. The long term problem is gas permeability - oxygen is going to be going through the bag, slowly, forever. The better the bag the slower it happens. If you have oxygen absorbers in the bag they keep absorbing any oxygen that comes through.
Where did you find your scoop? That looks like a perfect fit. Enjoy your videos, thanks
It does work well for bagging. We "adjusted" a scoop we found on Amazon. This is the video of how we made it - Food Scoop For Freeze Dryer Tray ruclips.net/video/trs26E42Zho/видео.html
and this is an Amazon affiliate link to the scoop I used for the scoop project: amzn.to/3pdTB4J
No issues piling them up like that? I was under the impression that you needed to do a single layer in the FD
I stack mine and have had no problems at all. It takes a little time to separate them without breaking them. I cut mine into half rings. Hope this helps
@@suprmn awesome thanks, just got ours and this is very helpful
So whats the purpose of the thermometer and what temps are you looking for?
The food is not dry if it's still cold. This doesn't work as well with loose things like apple slices, but it's my habit. The tray temperature is set for 115f for the apples. The thermometers are not really necessary, I just don't like to have to open the machine to check the food, and if it's not dry, add time. If it's not warm it's not done and I can add time well it's still running.
Using this video for an example - ruclips.net/video/wn6v_9M905E/видео.html I was looking to make sure all the thermometers get up to the temperature that the trays are set at, for at least a couple hours. I had the tray temp set for 110f for the milk. The bottom tray had been over 110f until the tray heaters turn off during the last 15 minutes of the final dry cycle. (it shows a lower temp in the video)
How did you get the round slices? By cutting it differently?
By just cutting from the center outward after the peeler, corer, slicer.
Does leaving the skins on hinder the drying?
No, it doesn't seem to be an issue, but if we want to use them for pie filling later, we found we need to peel them.
Mine were nice and white until I tried to rehydrate them. Then they turned brown. What did I do wrong?
(Feeding the algorithm with another response here.😇)
We don't usually rehydrate our apple slices, we just eat them dry. Love them! After getting your question, I did a little test with 2 slices of the freeze dried apples. (I'll post a photo on the channel Community page) I took two small bowls of water and put a slice of apple in each. In one bowl I added some citric acid and ascorbic acid and the other is just plain water. Surprise! The slice that's in just plan water started to turned brown in just seconds. (Okay the seconds may have been more than 60, but it was quick.) I had thought that the fact that I had dipped them in citric acid and ascorbic acid water before freeze drying would have been enough. It's not.
Hi Barbara, I've posted the apple photo over on the Community page.
During my drying cycles my new Medium dryer never gets above 10 degrees - any recommendations ? it’s a brand new med HR- when i tested the drying the heat worked- and mtorr are 51
I'll put this here too, because someone else might see it and be able to help.
I've never had this issue so I'm just going to be guessing a bit, but here goes:)
So you already know, from your heat test, that the heaters can heat up, now the question is why aren't they heating up when you run a batch. Or, are they heating up and the display is lying.
Where I'd start:
Is the machine freeze drying? Is ice forming on the chamber walls? By any chance is the dry temperature turned way down in the custom settings? (I don't know if the new machines can go that low. Mine can, but my sister's machine is in use so I can't check it right now)
I would start by checking the 'Tray Temperature' settings. Next, I'd check the actual temperature by putting a thermometer in the machine, on one of the trays or in the food. This would check to see if the display temperature is working or if it's lying and it really is heating. (Software vs hardware?)
i got thermometer like yours so i’ll put in food and check all your suggestions! you responded so quick thanks. i’m using all your methods of weighing several times , wrapping my opening etc. i learn so much from you! thanks
@@kpowers9002 I hope we can troubleshoot this and make it go.
🤣I would love to drive around the country (in a mini van camper conversion packed full of freeze dried food!) to help people to figure out their Freeze Dryer issues. (and make videos of it) 🤣 I know that most people hate it, but I love troubleshooting. But it's harder to do remotely.
what is the best thickness for the freeze drier?
The 'best' in what sense? The thickness of each individual piece of food, or the thickness of the food on the tray?
It's mostly about the trade-off of time vs amount you can dry in a batch. Bigger pieces and/or more on a tray will be slower. Also, the rehydration time is much longer if the pieces are bigger. Consider this: Beef Stew - Homemade vs Mountain House ruclips.net/video/w_p5j5oyX5M/видео.htmlsi=EDnRU4eGT7rKTZNe&t=623
the thickness of the apple s splices. @@SchoolReports
In that case, I love the thinner slices for snacking on!
I've done some thicker slices and I have not liked them as much.
where do you get 2 gallon bags?
We got ours at Chef'Store. They are Dynamic brand resealable freezer bags. The price was just over 18 cents per bag. I know that Ziploc makes 2 gallon ones also, but I they tend to cost a lot more.
How long does it take on average for apples to freeze dry?
I don't know for that batch because I didn't track most batches.
This batch was about 41 hours ruclips.net/video/HShE_KexX90/видео.html
This batch was about 39 1/2 hours ruclips.net/video/ueSdOSjXfyM/видео.html
This batch was about 43 1/2 hours ruclips.net/video/E0_yOqRIJBU/видео.html
@@SchoolReports Thanks so much. Just got my freeze dryer last week.
@@vickiebonano2092 The newer machines are faster and the thin apple slices (like in this video) will also dry faster. Plus, if we hadn't stuffed 10 lbs on the trays (like the other videos) it would have been faster too. BTW, I LOVE the thin slices; they're the best!
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Hi 😁