Just wondering if anyone has experimented with dehydrating they're own camp food. I've done a lot of fruit, and I want to do some veggies to make things like stew and side dishes (carrots, beans, peas, maybe a rutabaga or potatoes). How well do these things rehydrate, and how much should I cook them prior to putting them in the dehydrator. The instructions with my dehydrator say one thing, a dehydrating cookbook I bought says another. I heard buying frozen veggies doesn't do so well, but I have veggies from the garden that I blanched and froze myself. Do you think those might work better?

wrote on Jul 25^th, 2008 at 5:14pm:

. I heard buying frozen veggies doesn't do so well, but I have veggies from the garden that I blanched and froze myself. Do you think those might work better?

For our chicken dumpling soup I buy a couple of bags of frozen veggies, thaw them and then dehydrate them. I have also done fresh veggies that I blanched myself. (Personally like the frozen better, simply easier)Both seem to work fine, they look a little funny but taste fine.  I am sure with more effort and practice I could improve my technique.  If you browse through the What's Cooking forum you should find several threads discussing dehyrdating.

I do not have a lot of experience drying vegetables, but I can share what I have. First, I haven't had any issues drying store purchased frozen. In fact, frozen corn seemed to turnout well. I literally just dumped the frozen corn right into the dehydrator. It dried and rehydrated just fine.

On beans, I have found that you need to "air" dry beans before adding them to the dehydrator. If you do not, they split and turn to mush when rehydrated.

plafromboise wrote on Jul 25^th, 2008 at 6:29pm:

On beans, I have found that you need to "air" dry beans before adding them to the dehydrator. If you do not, they split and turn to mush when rehydrated.

Good to know. I have a lot of beans from my garden. I'll peruse the old posts for more on dehydrating. :)

chandasue:

Welcome aboard.

I have no experience with veggies because all of the reading that I have done makes it sound like a lot of work.  I took dehydrated mixed veggies that I bougt at a bulk market and they were fantastic.  You can buy them online here.

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Here are the new things that I did for my Q trip this year that worked very well:

Taco meat.  Cook very lean ground beef, rinse with hot water and then cook with the taco sauce packet.  Dry on tray liners.

Refried beans (use a jerky shooter to put it on the tray liners).

Get a bag of frozen mixed fruit (Aldi) thaw, put in blender and top off with Welch's Concord Grape Juice.  Dehydrate like fruit leather but for much longer to the very crispy point and then powder it in a small food processor.  It rehydrates like apple sauce but is much tastier.

Pasta sauce.  Do the same as the fruit I mentioned above (skip the Grape Juice!)

Pasta.  I pre-cook rotini (well done, not aldente) and dehydrate it.  It rehydrates quickly and takes very little fuel to  warm it up.  I like rotini because it grabs the sauce.

Sorry if I went off on a tangent from the original question, but I don't think I've shared these on QJ yet.

I've dehydrated peas, green beans, okra and carrots all from frozen foods and had success with each.  However, I heat them up in a microwave before they go on the dehydrator, a step that supposedly keeps the veggies from spoiling.  In years past, I started the food prep a couple of months before my trips and never had any problems.

This year I decided to try to simplify the food prep and ordered from Harmony House as Beefman suggested above.  Since I don't have a garden readily producing homegrown veggies, this alternative saved me time, and was cheaper than most other options.  I'll let you know how the end product tastes in my trip report, but their veggies look fine, and they were easy to order online.

I've had good luck with frozen peas and corn.  I have dried salsa (it helps if you blend it, it dries evenly), beef (as beefman described, worked well) and several home cooked meals.  Pasta with redsauce and beans is a favorite as is black bean stew.  I make a potatoe/veggies sausage/onion/egg dish, dry it, rehydrate it and fry it as a hash--this is very popular.  I've tried dishes that have not worked so well, but mostly I've had good luck.  Try to keep veggie pieces, etc even sized so that they dry well.  
I purchase dry mixed veggies at the local co-op  because they are relatively cheap and make a good soup base-easier than drying all the separate veggies.  I got a lot of ideas from a book called Backpacker's Gourmet (I think that's the title) by a woman who's name is Linda_____?  I can't say that I've liked all of her recipes, some were actually bad, but it's a good jumping off point for figuring out what works.  She aims for one pot meals, which I appreciate.
For a while, I just made extra of whatever I was having for dinner and tried drying some of it.  Give it a few weeks and rehydrate and consider whether I would want to eat it next to a lake somewhere.
One thing I've found.  I prefer to dry beef apart from a meal like chili.  It seems like I have less incidence of spoilage.  Also, the chili itself will keep for a long time if treated well, the beef not so well.  I just dry what I need in beef and mix it into the meal before rehydrating.  
 Much really depends on your style of camping cooking.  I used to like to have lots of dry ingredients and could make up different dishes depending on my mood.  Now I tend to like it as simple and light as possible, as I usually solo paddle and rarely want to put extra energy into feeding myself when there are other interesting things to do.  I tend to bring one or two meals that are more than simple rehydration to give myself some variety.
All this being said, I have grown overly fond of the "just add boiling water to the foil pouch and wait ten minutes" style of food for ease.  It feels like cheating, but oh it's nice when you have had a long day.
Nuff said for now.
Good luck,
gp
 

The book is Backpackers Gourmet by Linda Frederick Yaffe.  Like I said, I didn't like everything I tried, but it's a good look at some of the kinds of meals you can dry.  She is very light on seasoning in my eyes.

Our trips into Quetico are generally for 18-20 days, so using the dehydrator is a must.  As other have mentioned, frozen mixed vegies, corn and peas dehydrate well.  We also make a chili, which dehydrates
well, and venison stew.  When making the stew, we cut the meat into 1/4 inch chunks to make the meat and vegies dry evenly.  When drying ground meat, I season it lightly and add chopped onions while cooking, and then dehydrate.  Rehydrate, add a packet of gravy mix and re-hydrated veges, serve with instant mashed potates for a backwoods shepherd's pie.  (We only use venison, which has virtually no fat.)
Dried applesauce makes good fruit leather.  Another fruit that dehydrates well is wild blueberries.  The secret is to parboil until the skin
splits, drain and pat dry with paper towel, and dehydrate.  Rehydrate with boiling water, and add to pancakes, bannock, or oatmeal! Pineapple chunks, apple slices or banana slices round out our diet.  Even as I type the dehydrator is humming away in the kitchen as we prepare for our put-in on Aug. 18!!