We recently snagged a bargain on some IRD5 Near Infra Red Dehydrators that were ‘smart’. This means they detect how much moisture is in the food and adjust themselves automatically.
Think it sounds like a gimmick? We did too…
Boy were we wrong! The quality build & stainless trays sort of gave it away so we purchased a number of them and offered them on a first in first served basis (sorry they are all gone!).
We especially like the way this machine tries to mimic the natural God created way of drying (in the sun). This leaves more of the needed nutrition in the food – possibility the only way of getting healthier results is outdoor air drying? This can be done with the Sun Oven, a solar dryer (we plan to develop one of these!) or a dehydrator.
We had already tested for drying fruit and tomatoes – now it was time for MEAT!
We have tested with a few cuts of beef (roo is next!), basically anything that was marked down or on special then followed the basic steps below:
Preparation:
- Trim the fat off. (We aren’t too picky with this as we like it chewy!)
- Cut into thin strips about 5mm thick and 2-3cm wide
- Marinate for minimum 4 hours (we do overnight)
Marinade:
We normally do a few different recipes for each batch due to our appreciation of extreme chilli. Often the kids will do one each and just add this and that until they are happy with it.
Our list of regular ingredients are:
- Worcestershire Sauce
- Soy Sauce (dark / light / mushroom)
- Bragg Soy Sauce Alternative (Tamari)
- Oyster Sauce
- Paprika (smoky is best!)
- Onion Flakes
- Tumeric / specialist flavours
- Chilli
- Sesame Oil (tiny bit!)
You can be as creative as you like – some like it sweet so you can add mango, nectarine or apple juice concentrate. Go wild!
When marinating – make sure you immerse all of the meat, then cover & put in the fridge.
Dehydrating:
When ready to dry, some people dab the meat dry with a paper towel. If you only like light flavour, or it has been marinated for a longer period, this can be a good idea.
We generally just lay the strips on baking paper for the first hour of drying to make cleaning the dehydrator easier, and use the ‘solar’ and ‘auto’ setting*. Soooo easy!
Some really strong flavours in this one – and LOTS of chilli!
After about an hour (depending on how runny the marinade you used was), we take the baking paper out and leave the machine to do it’s wonder.
Side note – our dehydrator sits next to the Kombucha giving a little extra warmth to spend the fermentation = double whammy!
The dehydrator gives an indication to show how long is left, when nearly finished make sure you do 10 minutes near the end with a high temperature (60-70ºC) to kill any possible nasties in the meat. If your dehydrator can’t do this, it is recommended to use the oven for this step.
The finished product before it gets devoured:
So, SO good!
To have some of this in the pantry is simply incredible…we are very blessed to be able to have such healthy and delicious snacks.
To say this machine will get a work out with us is an understatement! Any fruit that we are given, is on special or we have excess of will be thrown in. So worth the investment!
Get drying!