take a skewer 3mm diameter or so and pierce the meatballs once before freezedrying ... with this you should be able to better adjust the rehydration time of the meatballs more holes = faster rehydration
I was going to ask you where you got your dividers and then saw the link. I just ordered my machine yesterday and spent the rest of the day shopping for supply's. I couldn't find the dividers. I just ordered a set from you, thank you for having them.
Just did a batch of spaghetti and meatballs. Cut the meatballs into 1/8 pieces and freeze dried first. Then I did a full batch of the pasta topped with sauce and topped with parm cheese. I have the medium freeze drier..used your dividers. We had 5 portions per tray. Put the pasta/sauce portions with 1/4 c of meatball chunks per bag. Rehydrated with 3/4c water for 15 mins in the bag....was AWESOME! Thank you for the video..definitely a win. BTW. 3 lbs of pasta will fill 4 medium trays.
Congratulations on the 100,000! I am just doing my 2nd load with my new freeze dryer. I'm so happy with my purchase! Your videos are outstanding and I appreciate the time and energy you put into these! Frying up 6 lbs of hamburger to do in my next load!
*@Freedom Lover* You must try his Chili Mac! Wow! Great recipe! Dries beautifully! _Delish!_ The spaghetti I would have made it up like I was serving it, mixed well; using ground beef or Italian sausage instead of meatballs. In fact, think I'll make some tomorrow!
You can solve the meatball problem by frying ground beef into crumbles. The crumbles rehydrate really well. In fresh spaghetti, I usually add the meat crumbles to the sauce so it's distributed evenly. I'll have to experiment with that to see if it's better to FD them mixed or separately.
Thank you so much for this, and your other videos. THeyve been very informative! I recently had four of the large freeze dryers donated to my food bank kitchen. I’ve been testing vegetables and starches, this coming week, I start testing proteins. I cana’t wait to start making freeze dried meals for our unhoused clients!
Your project sounds interesting! Do you have a page or are you pretty much doing this on your own? I admit...I had been thinking of how something like this could help those in need. ~Sharon
Cooked ground sirloin or beef (etc.) with Spanish Rice, Spaghetti w/ meat or Stroganoff all work really well rehydrated. Maybe the meatballs are just too dense? When I make Spanish Rice, it's a full meal (ground beef, onions, bell peppers, cooked brown rice and plenty of diced tomatoes, sauce and chili powder). Thank you for the trials ... saves me miles! :-)
I would have tossed the pasta and sauce together before loading the trays to assure a good coating of all the noodles. Maybe try rigatoni, peppers and sausage next time? I’m working on Indian Curry recipes.
Peppers Sausage, awesome! I'm waiting on my Freeze Dryer, a small one in early December. I dehydrate vegetables, and do canning, but I think freeze drying will get my meat and regular meals to another level.
PLEASE MAKE DIVIDERS FOR SMALL TRAYS! Have recent received my HR small with oil-less pump...LOVE IT! Have some silicone prepping TRAYS but would enjoy more choices for maximizing my trays. Enjoy your journeys...recently paid off my ex, I own 11 rentals clear again!
Thanks for this instructional video. I really like that you split the meals into pre-made vs just individual ingredients. I do have one question about "freeze drying" spaghetti with respect to prepping, do they actually last longer in the freeze dried state in mylar or in the original state in mylar? If it is about the same, then I am guessing that the one advantage to freeze drying would be that the noodles don't take as long to cook, simply rehydrate with hot water, and its done in a couple of minutes as opposed to a much longer cooking time with regular noodles?
I feel like people get too wrapped up in changing settings. For 99% of foods, just put them in and let the freeze dryer do its thing. Just my take on it
Thanks for all the videos and extra stuff. I'm looking forward to getting a freeze dryer and start putting away food that doesn't require refrigeration.
I love your dividers. I use them often to divide food, freeze, then take the dividers out of the food before freezer drying. This allows the food to freeze dry faster in my opinion. Thanks for creating useful products!
something I would be interested in seeing you try. RE VAC the meatballs! get containers with those "lids" that have the little port so you can "vac seal" the jar. meat balls. hot water. seal and vac. it should not take much vac pressure to lower the gas pressure IN the meatballs themselves which will help them to "suck in" the water. I wonder if that would work to really speed up the process?
Just freeze dried instant flavored oatmeal because the use by date is coming up. I learned use half of the required water to make the oatmeal, since only taking the water out again. I had to run 2 times and defrost the dryer due to the large amount of water in the oatmeal. It is worth it to lengthen the time the oatmeal will be good for now.
I want a freeze dryer so badly. I started saving 5$ a month towards my goal to buy one. Unfortunately I think it's going to take me a long time😞. In the meantime I'll just live my dream through your Channel.❤
I was in the same situation as you, slowly saving up to buy one. Then one day I found out Home Depot actually sells Harvest Right Freeze Dryers, not only that I got it on the HD credit card with 12 months interest free. Now I'm freeze drying all I can : D
You might try putting your combo meatballs and spaghetti upside down with the meat balls on the bottom and the spaghetti on the top when you re-hydrate the MRE. That way the sauce and spaghetti will hold your meatballs under the water making them more likely to get moistened. It just looks like you are trying to rush the process and I agree it may be better to separate the ingredients. Good video valuable info.
I'm marathon watching! Really enjoy your vids, especially the sangria :). It's perfect timing because I just broke ground on a house I'm building and I'll be homesteading. I rearranged things to fit the large freeze dryer in my kitchen versus the laundry/pantry. I also decided against the medium Harvest Right because I know I'll be using it quite a bit. Because of supply chain disruptions I'm not 100% sure when the house will be done but I would love to join your freeze drying group as I get closer to getting things setup.
Can you please tell me what brand scale you use? Waiting on our freeze dryer, we ordered from your link. We watch you daily, learning so much from your videos.
While nice big meat balls is great, I think I would just do ground beef with the same seasoning and do the 3 packs as individual ingredients and once everything is rehydrated I’d mix the meat into the sauce for more of a ‘meat sauce’ effect. Great vid as usual. I pulled the trigger last week and ordered one. Love the idea of the dividers and stackers but the cost of shipping to out of the USA is insane sadly.
Lots if variables to the answer but 7-10 years in my opinion. They can probably go much longer, but I rotate older foods fir newer. I have videos on steak, fish, pork chops etc.
I love show, i wish i could help people with the Freeze drying .I live SA .Its crazy here food will run out.any help from anyone anywhere before power goes off will be a big help.keep safe out there.
Hello there! Great video! I am a little confused about how you came up with 1/2 cup of water to reconstitute the spaghetti. Can you please tell me exactly how you got that again? Thank you!
the best way on these types of recipes is to weigh the trays before and after freeze drying. The difference in weight is the amount of water that you need to add back in for rehydration. If you use dividers, just divide that amount by the amount of portions.
I don’t want to be disrespectful, but they do sell the same exact ones on Amazon & Etsy, by SophosSurvival, for significantly cheaper. These are almost 35-40% more.
Your not rude. I don’t know much about Etsy so for Amazon I will look and see what they offer. After using the harvest right I’m very happy and my kids love all the food I have done. Ya the price is a lot but now that I have used mine so much. I wish I would of gotten the biggest one they sell.
Tell me more about the "pillow". What is it? What is it's function? When should it be used? Where to get one or two? Do they need to be washed are they machine washable?
I would use the "broth" created by rehydrating the meatballs to rehydrate the noodles and sauce to prevent flavor loss. Same idea with rice, make it using the meat broth and gain a lot of flavor in your meal. We do that even with daily cooking, boiling rice in bone broth gives so much flavor and added protein.
New to freeze drying, planning to buy my first one in the next couple of months. Can anyone tell me when/why you would choose to use the pillow or not?
It is really great work my friend, thank you for this effort, perhaps you can provide translation into Arabic, is the taste different after freeze drying or the same original taste, I am very interested in this technology in food preservation
I just made my 1st purchase from your supplies link. I love that option. Also, I'm not a big fan of store bought meatballs as they are to dense. Homemade is always better.
When I make spaghetti sauce, I fry up a combination of Italian sausage and hamburger in crumbles and add that to my sauce. And I bet that would rehydrate much easier and be easier to make.
Great video. I am looking forward to making freeze dried spaghetti. I make my spaghetti sauce with lean ground turkey. I think it might be better to mix the spaghetti sauce and noodles together, then freeze dry. I am surprised you used the pillow since you did a video not using it. Is there a reason why you used the pillow?
The pad that you put in the door section of the drier before closing it why and where can I get one? also some of the different trays and dividers where from please.
They were included until a couple years ago as extra chamber insulation. They created alot of vacuum problems so they were eliminated and the difference from what I can tell is minimal.
TRAY DIVIDERS for the win! GET YOURS at www.freezedryingsupplies.com
take a skewer 3mm diameter or so and pierce the meatballs once before freezedrying ...
with this you should be able to better adjust the rehydration time of the meatballs
more holes = faster rehydration
Can I adapt the medium tray dividers to fit into my small (3 tray) freeze dryer ?
@@raydennis6409 Yes, they can be cut
I was going to ask you where you got your dividers and then saw the link. I just ordered my machine yesterday and spent the rest of the day shopping for supply's. I couldn't find the dividers. I just ordered a set from you, thank you for having them.
@@standdown4929 thats great! You will love them!
I appreciate the fact that you rehydrate and try things in the videos after you make them. It’s nice to see how things turn out.
Joined the Facebook group. Thanks for the info!! So cool!!
These kinds of things look really awesome for hurricane prone florida.
Glad you designed these, it's BRILLIANT. I will be ordering them today, be quiet and just take my money already.
Just did a batch of spaghetti and meatballs. Cut the meatballs into 1/8 pieces and freeze dried first. Then I did a full batch of the pasta topped with sauce and topped with parm cheese. I have the medium freeze drier..used your dividers. We had 5 portions per tray. Put the pasta/sauce portions with 1/4 c of meatball chunks per bag. Rehydrated with 3/4c water for 15 mins in the bag....was AWESOME! Thank you for the video..definitely a win. BTW. 3 lbs of pasta will fill 4 medium trays.
How much time did it take to FD your Spaghetti?
Hey, you are working more thank most do with a full time job. So happy you have created a business you love.
Recently we got our freeze dryer and we cannot wait to use it for stuff like this. So far we've done the basics. We love watching this channel!
Congrats on 100K subscribers-you’re channel deserves it!
Thank you so much!
Congratulations on the 100,000! I am just doing my 2nd load with my new freeze dryer. I'm so happy with my purchase! Your videos are outstanding and I appreciate the time and energy you put into these! Frying up 6 lbs of hamburger to do in my next load!
That is awesome!
*@Freedom Lover*
You must try his Chili Mac! Wow! Great recipe! Dries beautifully! _Delish!_
The spaghetti I would have made it up like I was serving it, mixed well; using ground beef or Italian sausage instead of meatballs. In fact, think I'll make some tomorrow!
You can solve the meatball problem by frying ground beef into crumbles. The crumbles rehydrate really well. In fresh spaghetti, I usually add the meat crumbles to the sauce so it's distributed evenly. I'll have to experiment with that to see if it's better to FD them mixed or separately.
Exactly what I was going to say.
season the meat like a meat ball before your do it.
Just purchased the large freeze dryer through your affiliate link, thank you so much for the channel and direction.
Hope you enjoy it!
Definitely gonna buy those dividers! Excellent product.
Weighting those trays like Heisenelli... Amazing product.
Thank you so much for this, and your other videos. THeyve been very informative! I recently had four of the large freeze dryers donated to my food bank kitchen. I’ve been testing vegetables and starches, this coming week, I start testing proteins. I cana’t wait to start making freeze dried meals for our unhoused clients!
Your project sounds interesting! Do you have a page or are you pretty much doing this on your own? I admit...I had been thinking of how something like this could help those in need. ~Sharon
What a generous and thoughtful donation.
Yes awesome donation. You should start a RUclips channel now!
homeless
Cooked ground sirloin or beef (etc.) with Spanish Rice, Spaghetti w/ meat or Stroganoff all work really well rehydrated. Maybe the meatballs are just too dense? When I make Spanish Rice, it's a full meal (ground beef, onions, bell peppers, cooked brown rice and plenty of diced tomatoes, sauce and chili powder). Thank you for the trials ... saves me miles! :-)
Excellent experiment.
welp.. guess what I'm FDing this weekend... haha Thank you!
Looks great
wow good insight
I would so do this one!
I would have tossed the pasta and sauce together before loading the trays to assure a good coating of all the noodles.
Maybe try rigatoni, peppers and sausage next time? I’m working on Indian Curry recipes.
Great idea!
Peppers Sausage, awesome! I'm waiting on my Freeze Dryer, a small one in early December. I dehydrate vegetables, and do canning, but I think freeze drying will get my meat and regular meals to another level.
PLEASE MAKE DIVIDERS FOR SMALL TRAYS! Have recent received my HR small with oil-less pump...LOVE IT! Have some silicone prepping TRAYS but would enjoy more choices for maximizing my trays. Enjoy your journeys...recently paid off my ex, I own 11 rentals clear again!
Ours be here Tuesday. I can’t wait.
Welcome to the freeze drying community!
Love watching all your videos. Can’t wait to get a freeze dryer.
Thanks! Looks great. I am making jolibee spaghetti and this will be perfect for portioning.
Great!
Awesome video
This is a terrific video! Thanks for sharing and for the inspiration! Congratulations on making 100+K ! ~Sharon
Thank you so much!
❤ Yummmmmm. Great idea!!!
Congrats on the 108+,000 SUBS SWEET
Thanks so much!!
Can't wait till you make some of those dividers for us small Harvest Right owners :)
Thanks for this instructional video. I really like that you split the meals into pre-made vs just individual ingredients. I do have one question about "freeze drying" spaghetti with respect to prepping, do they actually last longer in the freeze dried state in mylar or in the original state in mylar? If it is about the same, then I am guessing that the one advantage to freeze drying would be that the noodles don't take as long to cook, simply rehydrate with hot water, and its done in a couple of minutes as opposed to a much longer cooking time with regular noodles?
Great video 👍🏻👍🏻💥
love your videos, but I'm trying to find out more about the settings you use on your Harvest Right when you do these.
I feel like people get too wrapped up in changing settings. For 99% of foods, just put them in and let the freeze dryer do its thing. Just my take on it
excellent
I psi can and dehydrate ect I can’t wait to buy a freeze dryer
You will probably rarely can after you purchase a freeze dryer
Thanks for all the videos and extra stuff. I'm looking forward to getting a freeze dryer and start putting away food that doesn't require refrigeration.
Enjoyed
This is good. Pls what is the best freeze dryer to buy now that will last in Nigeria.
Gonna have to try, I found out not to have trays to heavy otherwise vacuum errors come up.
I love your dividers. I use them often to divide food, freeze, then take the dividers out of the food before freezer drying. This allows the food to freeze dry faster in my opinion. Thanks for creating useful products!
You got it! Glad to hear they work for you
something I would be interested in seeing you try. RE VAC the meatballs! get containers with those "lids" that have the little port so you can "vac seal" the jar. meat balls. hot water. seal and vac. it should not take much vac pressure to lower the gas pressure IN the meatballs themselves which will help them to "suck in" the water.
I wonder if that would work to really speed up the process?
Just freeze dried instant flavored oatmeal because the use by date is coming up. I learned use half of the required water to make the oatmeal, since only taking the water out again. I had to run 2 times and defrost the dryer due to the large amount of water in the oatmeal.
It is worth it to lengthen the time the oatmeal will be good for now.
Great content, thanks!
congratulations on 100,000 i am going to try the spegetti
Good luck!
I want a freeze dryer so badly. I started saving 5$ a month towards my goal to buy one. Unfortunately I think it's going to take me a long time😞. In the meantime I'll just live my dream through your Channel.❤
You can put on layaway and pay what you want when you want when you buy from Harvest Right. That will "freeze" the price.
@@linkay6 i don’t see a layaway option when you check out...
@@truefireangel I called and placed my order and was able to put it on layaway. Sorry I don't know how to do it when ordering online.
I was in the same situation as you, slowly saving up to buy one. Then one day I found out Home Depot actually sells Harvest Right Freeze Dryers, not only that I got it on the HD credit card with 12 months interest free. Now I'm freeze drying all I can : D
For Christmas and birthday, ask for donations to your FD saving fund.
You might try putting your combo meatballs and spaghetti upside down with the meat balls on the bottom and the spaghetti on the top when you re-hydrate the MRE. That way the sauce and spaghetti will hold your meatballs under the water making them more likely to get moistened. It just looks like you are trying to rush the process and I agree it may be better to separate the ingredients. Good video valuable info.
This is next on my list to do. I might try meat sauce and like you said, cut the meatballs up into smaller pieces.
I'm marathon watching! Really enjoy your vids, especially the sangria :). It's perfect timing because I just broke ground on a house I'm building and I'll be homesteading. I rearranged things to fit the large freeze dryer in my kitchen versus the laundry/pantry. I also decided against the medium Harvest Right because I know I'll be using it quite a bit. Because of supply chain disruptions I'm not 100% sure when the house will be done but I would love to join your freeze drying group as I get closer to getting things setup.
Great! Thanks so much for your support and I wish you luck on the home build.
Hi . I think if you use minced beef it will be perfect 🎉
thank you sir
My pleasure
Yes. Vacuum issues are from putting pillow in before the gasket. I was having same issues so I stopped doing that.
Very cool! Though I think I'd cut the meatballs in 4ths. Just so they rehydrate at the same rate.
Oh lol, I wrote that comment before he got to the vacation story.
Yeah, ground Italian sausage or beef would be much easier, and mix well with sauce before drying.
How long would the spaghetti and meatballs MRE last in the mylar?
Can you please tell me what brand scale you use? Waiting on our freeze dryer, we ordered from your link. We watch you daily, learning so much from your videos.
Great to watch, need some new recipes
Working on it!
How did the whole all n one meal dehydrate? I see u did the individual that u freeze dried.
While nice big meat balls is great, I think I would just do ground beef with the same seasoning and do the 3 packs as individual ingredients and once everything is rehydrated I’d mix the meat into the sauce for more of a ‘meat sauce’ effect.
Great vid as usual. I pulled the trigger last week and ordered one. Love the idea of the dividers and stackers but the cost of shipping to out of the USA is insane sadly.
If you make your own sauce, does it have to be cold before you put it in the FD?
Would a pressure chamber help with the rehydration of harder things like the meatballs?
What is the pillow? When and why d you use it? And where do you get one?
What is the pillow for? where do you get one
cooked food, or meat such as pork chop or steak, how long does it last and how does it hidrate?
Lots if variables to the answer but 7-10 years in my opinion. They can probably go much longer, but I rotate older foods fir newer. I have videos on steak, fish, pork chops etc.
I love show, i wish i could help people with the Freeze drying .I live SA .Its crazy here food will run out.any help from anyone anywhere before power goes off will be a big help.keep safe out there.
Keep good records of weights pre and post so you know how much water to add
Should you get the medium freeze dry or the small one I live in a trailer home
It will ultimately depend on your needs and situation. Think about how often it will run and the amount you are trying to produce before purchasing.
Hello there! Great video! I am a little confused about how you came up with 1/2 cup of water to reconstitute the spaghetti. Can you please tell me exactly how you got that again? Thank you!
the best way on these types of recipes is to weigh the trays before and after freeze drying. The difference in weight is the amount of water that you need to add back in for rehydration. If you use dividers, just divide that amount by the amount of portions.
Do I have to defrost the unit between every batch. I am a brand new eager learner.
I’m sold on the tray dividers
I don’t want to be disrespectful, but they do sell the same exact ones on Amazon & Etsy, by SophosSurvival, for significantly cheaper. These are almost 35-40% more.
Your not rude. I don’t know much about Etsy so for Amazon I will look and see what they offer. After using the harvest right I’m very happy and my kids love all the food I have done. Ya the price is a lot but now that I have used mine so much. I wish I would of gotten the biggest one they sell.
Where did you get the pillow?
So you recommend the small Harvest right?
It will be determined by your specific wants and demands of the machine. For most households, the small or medium will meet their needs.
What's the pillow for? And why would I use the oil filter thing the dryer came with?
What about inserts for Alpine?
Do you have to cook the noodles til they are done
You don't have to if you are fully cooking after rehydration. If you want to add warm or hot water, they will need to be cooked.
What is pillow used for?
Tell me more about the "pillow". What is it? What is it's function? When should it be used? Where to get one or two? Do they need to be washed are they machine washable?
Have you tried garden seeds......long term storage would be helpful. Would they germinate?
Yes, absolutely. I am launching a website in approximately two months that will sell them.
Yes, a high percent will germinate
I would use the "broth" created by rehydrating the meatballs to rehydrate the noodles and sauce to prevent flavor loss. Same idea with rice, make it using the meat broth and gain a lot of flavor in your meal. We do that even with daily cooking, boiling rice in bone broth gives so much flavor and added protein.
Great idea about the meatball eater!
Great suggestion
New to freeze drying, planning to buy my first one in the next couple of months. Can anyone tell me when/why you would choose to use the pillow or not?
If you live in a humid climate it can help with condensation. It has a slight effect on efficiency
@@thefreezedryingcommunity thank you! This channel is so helpful!
How did you get your freeze dry machine what do you go get one at
It is really great work my friend, thank you for this effort, perhaps you can provide translation into Arabic, is the taste different after freeze drying or the same original taste, I am very interested in this technology in food preservation
What is the pillow for? Thanks
They used to be included with the freeze dryers. They help with condensation and some insulation
I own the small due to the size of my apartment and the new pump is quieter than my ac unit but wish those dividers came for the small
We offer small, medium, large and soon the XL size dividers
I just made my 1st purchase from your supplies link. I love that option. Also, I'm not a big fan of store bought meatballs as they are to dense. Homemade is always better.
When will you be shipping to Canada?
We ship worldwide as of March
Dang you are making me hungry!! How long was the cycle? How much water did you pull out?
Hey people i was just pudding my sugar free pudding away after going threw the Harvest right. Sugar free chocolate pudding instant works
When I make spaghetti sauce, I fry up a combination of Italian sausage and hamburger in crumbles and add that to my sauce. And I bet that would rehydrate much easier and be easier to make.
the jarred spaghetti sauce didnt need to he cooked first before FD and then rehydrating?
Great video. I am looking forward to making freeze dried spaghetti. I make my spaghetti sauce with lean ground turkey. I think it might be better to mix the spaghetti sauce and noodles together, then freeze dry. I am surprised you used the pillow since you did a video not using it. Is there a reason why you used the pillow?
So you don't cook the food to rehydrate? Just add boiling water?
where do you get the pillow thing?
Use ground beef or chicken instead of meat balls in the sauce. It'll work 100% better. Thanks for sharing, looks great.
Does a freezdryer use more electricity that a dehydrator ?
Yes. Most dehydrator are just a warm fan blowing on the food the dry it. Different end result than a freeze dryer though
The pad that you put in the door section of the drier before closing it why and where can I get one? also some of the different trays and dividers where from please.
www.freezedryingsupplies.com
How long did it take to freeze dry? It looks like you did not freeze first...correct? Thank you!
What purpose does the pillow serve? I've never seen that.
They were included until a couple years ago as extra chamber insulation. They created alot of vacuum problems so they were eliminated and the difference from what I can tell is minimal.
What about mixing the spagetti, and the sauce?
Waaaaaay more sauce needed 😆
maybe use a meat sauce,,, love your channel