You need to put them directly on the trays in a thin layer. Then what works you have to grind into a fine powder before you rehydrate them and use the correct amount of water. The way Tod do it is measure it wet before, freeze dry it and measure after then you know the weight of water to add back. Many of these items that aren’t oil based actually freeze dry really well that way.
I think the entire batch was tainted by the oil. As the water left some of the items, the oil soaked up into it. I think you should retest removing the obvious bad guys, or use different containers/separators to keep the oil from soaking up into the other samples. Please?
I love that you guys are trying so many things in the freeze dry.... Keep up the awesome trails. Thank you all for doing this. Some day when I can afford a Freeze dryer.. I will know what I can & can't do! :)
I think the lime juice worked fine. Lime juice will freeze dry into a crystaline structure (which looks like what you got) I think the sticky came from something else (like the mayo) not the lime juice. it SHOULD FD into "almost nothing" as it is almost entirely water (it is VERY strong so it does not take much to make it work)
If you had used silicone instead of paper, the oil would've never ruined the rest. The lime juice worked, it becomes crystalized without the oil. (I've done lime and lemon) Not failures..., you learned from them... 😀
EpicenterBryan yup, best if frozen in tray and they both will be super duper concentrated and very thin on the tray after cycle... You'll need to scrape with spatula and get in a mason jar or mylar really quick because they absorb the moisture in the air really fast. Always happy to help. How lucky we are to have this option. I'd been looking at commercial FD'ers since 2007, but didn't want to spend $30,000 plus on one. When I found Harvestright2 yrs ago, I jumped... Fast... 😀😀😀
Franks hot sauce does very well dehydrated. I mix it in with my Hooters brand flour mix for coating hot wings before frying. It also makes a great dry rub for chicken breasts on the grill & smoker.
Very late addition to the conversation: I found a 2022 academic article on free drying liquid smoke. One very different aspect was the use of maltodextrin to encapsulate the LS, but if anyone is interested in the article it can be found by searching for "Effects of Spray‐Drying and Freeze‐Drying on Bioactive and Volatile Compounds of Smoke Powder Food Flavouring" by Xing Xin, Sinemobong Essien · Kiri Dell, Meng Wai Woo, Saeid Baroutian. I would post the link, but UA-cam frown on such.
Ok, I've had it! lol I just ordered the large unit. ( Lay a Way) Darn you! I have been putting it off in buying one until mid summer but you all look like you are having so much fun! I really need one. My hubby is a long haul trucker and he can sure use good home cooked meals out there on the road. Plus I'm a homesteader as well as a prepper. :D That unit is going to be run a LOT! :D
The more the salt content the quicker it thaws. The only way to check would be taking each one out right away and test it immediately. Things like soy sauce and worsteshire don't need to be dried, they last forever in the bottle and can't grow bacteria because of the axis and salt that's why they are used to make beef jerky, they preserve the meat.
Just curious.. the mustards and ketchup have a lot of vinegar in them.. would it be better to have a portion of the re hydrating liquid be vinegar for a better taste?
By the way, I did this type of test two weeks ago with plastic cups and dixie cups (what I had lying around). DON'T USE PLASTIC CUPS. The tray heat will melt the plastic even at such lower chamber temperatures, doy. Different hot sauces work differently. Sriracha seemed to work better than Frank's Red Hot in my test. Try comparing those two. Honey Dijon mustard came out well too. Sugars tend to crystallize, vinegars evaporate, and fats are just bad news.
Another prepper added 3 cups water to one cup ketchup and to one cup Sweet Baby Rays. He said it was good and it looked good too. He ground it into a powder and mixed with water to reconstitute. You might try it the next time you experiment.
This was a really good learning experience. It appears things with an oil base or mostly made of water (e.g. the liquid smoke) doesn't fair to well. Possibly even those with a lot of salt. Very interesting.
Lime juice does freeze dry. The oil has to be from another one of the condiments. I think using such porous liners skewed this experiment. Maybe look at the ones that you thought would do well and retry it in molds or another container so oils from food you know have oils doesn't cross over to foods you know does not have oils.
Worcester sauce - ˈwu̇s-tə(r)-ˌshir: Now this night gross people out but the main ingredient is fermented anchovies, however once blended with the barley malt vinegar, spirit vinegar, molasses, sugar, salt. Tamarind extract, onions, garlic, lemon and then allowed to mature for 18 months before bottling. It is very similar to Garum which was also a fermented fish sauce with herbs and spices used as a condiment in ancient Greece, Rome, and Byzantium.
Thanks. That was a fun one. But I'm really looking forward to trying the raw steaks from the same batch. As soon as it stops raining we will grill them and post the video...
hi ive tried freeze drying some baby food, bananas and honey mashed together. but the batch came out like a sponge it was wobbly and not dry. what did i do wrong? please help I also freeze dried some pomegranates and the middle parts were gooey. should i have had them in the drying cycle longer?
An old trick with condiments has been to dehydrate them in a normal dehydrater. Then grind them up in a coffee grinder. It makes a uniform powder that can be rehydrated or sprinkled on food.
Yes, firehousepantry.com has a powdered Red's hot sauce. Has the heat and vinegar flavor you expect from hot sauce. I tried it side by side fresh out of the bottle and powdered. The powdered wasn't quite as hot but definitely has the flavor with just a little less heat. I attribute that to the maltodextrin they add to it. It's in a lot of powdered food items because it is a filler, softens the heat if its hot. Think of salt and vinegar chips. If you had straight vinegar powder and it'd likely burn you. Acetic acid in powdered form is used in lab tests.
Could the white stuff on the green sauce be citric acid? I also agree that all of the oil covering the tray, interfered with some of the items. Could lime juice ...a whole bottle dried at a time, basically what would fill the tray? Otherwise i’ll stick with dried citrus slices
I'm sure it works. I think the trick (many people are finding ) is if it has high fructose corn syrup it does crazy things and doesn't freeze dry well. I'll try ketchup again using something that doesn't have that and we will see.
Appears the samples were put in way too thick. My Heinz ketchup came out fine at a little less than tray height. Did a gallon of ketchup and mustard and both now powder.
This was cool, but with some of these, dont they already have ungodly shelf lives? Like worshtershire sauce. Isnt that, unopened, like a decade long shelf life?
Thanks for posting this episode. It answers the questions I had. How about cooked/uncooked pasta from the package? I'm thinking it will shrink but who knows?
Added to the list. I can say that we have tried cooked pasta in Spaghetti sauce and also cooked Rotini pasta in sauce and they both retained their shape and size compared to the fully cooked version. I don't think we gain anything freeze drying uncooked pasta. Since it would still need to be cooked on the other side. The real gain is how quickly cooked pasta is ready to eat after being freeze dried and water is added back - it becomes "instant pasta" with no actual cooking.
Well, in the words of my daughter's Elmo potty training video, "Keep on trying". In my words, try separating like items and retry the experiment. This is so much fun to watch!
Mayo can break easily, especially if it gets too warm. That looked like broken mayo. If you can freeze dry lemon juice or vinegar (given the comment on someone successfully doing lemon and lime juice below), it might be interesting to try to make mayo from reconstituted whole eggs or just yolks, lemon juice and oil. I've made mayo with fresh whole eggs and just fresh yolks, most recipes are just yolks. If you have power and a stick blender, it's pretty easy. It's possible, but more finicky and time consuming, with a whisk if you don't have power.
a lot of these condiments will store for years in their original form as long as they are stored in dark and cool.........might be easier that spending the time to freeze dry
totally agree......some condiments seem to work when mixed with other ingredients.......will be testing more things this week....love your videos......
Let me know if you do anything with Mayo. I have a batch of potato salad I made with sour cream (which I know for sure freeze dries) that is ready to go in a batch...
I haven't dived into the ingredients on that one. What's the most valuable insight you can share as to what causes a "fail" in your mind? And what's up with that Worcestershire sauce and the crazy puffiness?
Just a tip somethings that have a really high sugar content don't do so well such as ketchup. Its really hit or miss with ketchup I've seen some work and some not work really depends on the brand you use and its ingredients. As a tip you greatly increase your chances on such items if you dilute them with water allowing them for a more solid freeze. The extra water you add just gets evaporated out anyway. this is most likely the reason the BBQ sauce failed especially since baby rays has such a high sugar content.
So it looks like anything with oils or sugars won't work. The ones that are dry could probably be ground down into a powder. Most mustards come in powdered form to make your own. I wonder how many others come in powdered form. The lime juice is 95% water, so all that was left of it was the ascorbic acids, the sugars and the oil from it. Coffee would dehydrate pretty good. You'd probably be left with a foamy (whatever container sized) lump of coffee crystals.
There was a bunch of oil on the heater above the tray, so I'm not 100% sure oil from one item didn't collect above and drip somewhere else on the tray. Some things clearly didn't work though...
I can tell you I had my first failure w/Better Than Bullion beef & chicken flavors. It raised up like a cake when you bake it. Made a huge mess in the machine. So stay away from that stuff. Happy to see your experiment so I don't have to do it.
Cant understand why anyone would do honey? It lasts forever in its normal state. There are some honey powders you can order that simulate the taste and last 25 years.. but its not real honey.
The more sugar, the less drying, ruined a lot of sweet pickles that way (I hate sweet ones anyway, that ain't no pickle), am surprised with the relish though.
Mustard, and half and half was about it. The ketchup was close - and will work with a brand that doesn't have high fructose corn syrup in it. We will try that again when I have time to search for a brand that doesn't have that.
I don't understand the experiment. Why would you try to freeze dry condiments and not the ingredients for the condiments. If it has water that's fine but you shouldn't freeze dry vinegar..
You need to put them directly on the trays in a thin layer. Then what works you have to grind into a fine powder before you rehydrate them and use the correct amount of water. The way Tod do it is measure it wet before, freeze dry it and measure after then you know the weight of water to add back. Many of these items that aren’t oil based actually freeze dry really well that way.
I think the entire batch was tainted by the oil. As the water left some of the items, the oil soaked up into it. I think you should retest removing the obvious bad guys, or use different containers/separators to keep the oil from soaking up into the other samples.
Please?
Agree
I love that you guys are trying so many things in the freeze dry.... Keep up the awesome trails. Thank you all for doing this. Some day when I can afford a Freeze dryer.. I will know what I can & can't do! :)
Funnest Freeze-Dry Experiment so far!
I think the lime juice worked fine. Lime juice will freeze dry into a crystaline structure (which looks like what you got) I think the sticky came from something else (like the mayo) not the lime juice. it SHOULD FD into "almost nothing" as it is almost entirely water (it is VERY strong so it does not take much to make it work)
If you had used silicone instead of paper, the oil would've never ruined the rest.
The lime juice worked, it becomes crystalized without the oil. (I've done lime and lemon)
Not failures..., you learned from them... 😀
Thanks for the inputs! So Lime and Lemon worked OK for you. Good to know. Kind of a polluted test but we will keep pressing on with inputs like yours!
EpicenterBryan yup, best if frozen in tray and they both will be super duper concentrated and very thin on the tray after cycle... You'll need to scrape with spatula and get in a mason jar or mylar really quick because they absorb the moisture in the air really fast. Always happy to help. How lucky we are to have this option. I'd been looking at commercial FD'ers since 2007, but didn't want to spend $30,000 plus on one.
When I found Harvestright2 yrs ago, I jumped... Fast... 😀😀😀
What is your most liked Freeze Drying experience? What really made your day?
EpicenterBryan
FD'd Chili, FD's Stouffer Lasagna,(there's a trick to doing this) and FD's Häagen Dazs Coffee Ice Cream Scoops. Yummo!!! Oh yeh, Raw eggs...you'll never eat powdered eggs again... 😀😀😀
Can you use silicone inside the unit or does it get too hot and too cold? I've seen some people use the Silpat mats.
This is a very good test actually. This is why you can freeze dry diced tomatoes (fresh) and grind to a powder and make your own ketchup.
Good point.
Franks hot sauce does very well dehydrated. I mix it in with my Hooters brand flour mix for coating hot wings before frying. It also makes a great dry rub for chicken breasts on the grill & smoker.
"Will it Freeze Dry?" is so much more interesting and fun than "Will It Blend?"
Really enjoy watching y'alls videos. Keep them coming.
Got about 6 more nearly ready...
Would using the silicone cupcake liners work better?
Ive done ketchup and mustard both came out great
Very late addition to the conversation:
I found a 2022 academic article on free drying liquid smoke.
One very different aspect was the use of maltodextrin to encapsulate the LS, but if anyone is interested in the article it can be found by searching for "Effects of Spray‐Drying and Freeze‐Drying on Bioactive and Volatile Compounds of Smoke Powder Food Flavouring" by Xing Xin, Sinemobong Essien · Kiri Dell, Meng Wai Woo, Saeid Baroutian. I would post the link, but UA-cam frown on such.
Ok, I've had it! lol I just ordered the large unit. ( Lay a Way) Darn you! I have been putting it off in buying one until mid summer but you all look like you are having so much fun! I really need one. My hubby is a long haul trucker and he can sure use good home cooked meals out there on the road. Plus I'm a homesteader as well as a prepper. :D That unit is going to be run a LOT! :D
I sure love ours! Got lots of plans for it this summer too.
I have a HUGE garden. No more hard dehydrated veggies and fruits for us :D
Just out of curiosity, how did it work out for you? I am looking at buying one.
The more the salt content the quicker it thaws. The only way to check would be taking each one out right away and test it immediately. Things like soy sauce and worsteshire don't need to be dried, they last forever in the bottle and can't grow bacteria because of the axis and salt that's why they are used to make beef jerky, they preserve the meat.
Just curious.. the mustards and ketchup have a lot of vinegar in them.. would it be better to have a portion of the re hydrating liquid be vinegar for a better taste?
By the way, I did this type of test two weeks ago with plastic cups and dixie cups (what I had lying around). DON'T USE PLASTIC CUPS. The tray heat will melt the plastic even at such lower chamber temperatures, doy.
Different hot sauces work differently. Sriracha seemed to work better than Frank's Red Hot in my test. Try comparing those two. Honey Dijon mustard came out well too. Sugars tend to crystallize, vinegars evaporate, and fats are just bad news.
Thanks for the inputs. We will try some other hot sauces at some point. So much to try!
thanks guys ... very useful :)
Another prepper added 3 cups water to one cup ketchup and to one cup Sweet Baby Rays. He said it was good and it looked good too. He ground it into a powder and mixed with water to reconstitute. You might try it the next time you experiment.
This was a really good learning experience. It appears things with an oil base or mostly made of water (e.g. the liquid smoke) doesn't fair to well. Possibly even those with a lot of salt. Very interesting.
You tried to turn liquid smoke into solid smoke? your hubris knows no bounds!
You all are going Cray Cray with the freeze dry!
Hey a new nickname. "Cray Cray, Bry Bry". I like it.
These things last up to 10 years freeze dried, we better learn to store up now.
Lime juice does freeze dry. The oil has to be from another one of the condiments. I think using such porous liners skewed this experiment. Maybe look at the ones that you thought would do well and retry it in molds or another container so oils from food you know have oils doesn't cross over to foods you know does not have oils.
For the things that might explode, could you make a domed cover out of cheese cloth? Maybe it would work to keep the kielbasa from making a mess.
Worcester sauce - ˈwu̇s-tə(r)-ˌshir:
Now this night gross people out but the main ingredient is fermented anchovies, however once blended with the barley malt vinegar, spirit vinegar, molasses, sugar, salt. Tamarind extract, onions, garlic, lemon and then allowed to mature for 18 months before bottling.
It is very similar to Garum which was also a fermented fish sauce with herbs and spices used as a condiment in ancient Greece, Rome, and Byzantium.
Great Info Have a wonderful Toy Filled Day
Can I use my silicon cupcake forms on the trays to freeze dry condiments?
Yes!
Great video.
Thanks. That was a fun one. But I'm really looking forward to trying the raw steaks from the same batch. As soon as it stops raining we will grill them and post the video...
I wonder if you used ketchup that way organic and doesn't contain high fructose corn syrup if that'd freeze
Why did you remove the plastic cups?
I am taking copious notes and I was not using a pencil....Now I am......Four out of so many......So, oil bad....Check!
hi ive tried freeze drying some baby food, bananas and honey mashed together. but the batch came out like a sponge it was wobbly and not dry. what did i do wrong? please help
I also freeze dried some pomegranates and the middle parts were gooey. should i have had them in the drying cycle longer?
I wish you tasted some of them. I will try the ketchup and mustard. Thanks!
you two are an adorable couple. nice video.
An old trick with condiments has been to dehydrate them in a normal dehydrater. Then grind them up in a coffee grinder. It makes a uniform powder that can be rehydrated or sprinkled on food.
Sprinkled on food? I like it!
Yes, firehousepantry.com has a powdered Red's hot sauce. Has the heat and vinegar flavor you expect from hot sauce. I tried it side by side fresh out of the bottle and powdered. The powdered wasn't quite as hot but definitely has the flavor with just a little less heat. I attribute that to the maltodextrin they add to it. It's in a lot of powdered food items because it is a filler, softens the heat if its hot. Think of salt and vinegar chips. If you had straight vinegar powder and it'd likely burn you. Acetic acid in powdered form is used in lab tests.
Additionally for the sandwich bread. Try Bridgford shelf stable bread. Multigrain, whole wheat, white etc.
Could the white stuff on the green sauce be citric acid? I also agree that all of the oil covering the tray, interfered with some of the items. Could lime juice ...a whole bottle dried at a time, basically what would fill the tray? Otherwise i’ll stick with dried citrus slices
when I was in the Army, '84-'88, they had freeze dried ketchup in some MRE's. it was tasty
I'm sure it works. I think the trick (many people are finding ) is if it has high fructose corn syrup it does crazy things and doesn't freeze dry well. I'll try ketchup again using something that doesn't have that and we will see.
Appears the samples were put in way too thick. My Heinz ketchup came out fine at a little less than tray height. Did a gallon of ketchup and mustard and both now powder.
Thanks for the inputs! Definitely worth another try especially on the ketchup.
Hi Bryan, I've watched this video before, but I wonder if you could try to do salad dressings and post a video on that.
Just bought mine but i would like to know the taste test if possible.
This was cool, but with some of these, dont they already have ungodly shelf lives?
Like worshtershire sauce. Isnt that, unopened, like a decade long shelf life?
Thanks for posting this episode. It answers the questions I had.
How about cooked/uncooked pasta from the package? I'm thinking it will shrink but who knows?
Added to the list. I can say that we have tried cooked pasta in Spaghetti sauce and also cooked Rotini pasta in sauce and they both retained their shape and size compared to the fully cooked version. I don't think we gain anything freeze drying uncooked pasta. Since it would still need to be cooked on the other side. The real gain is how quickly cooked pasta is ready to eat after being freeze dried and water is added back - it becomes "instant pasta" with no actual cooking.
@@EpicenterBryan Pasta dishes are our next meals going in!
Well, in the words of my daughter's Elmo potty training video, "Keep on trying". In my words, try separating like items and retry the experiment. This is so much fun to watch!
I guess I should have been more specific since you tried some dressings in this video. Cesar and French dressings
Maybe grind them catsup and then dehydrate the powder.
Mayo can break easily, especially if it gets too warm. That looked like broken mayo. If you can freeze dry lemon juice or vinegar (given the comment on someone successfully doing lemon and lime juice below), it might be interesting to try to make mayo from reconstituted whole eggs or just yolks, lemon juice and oil. I've made mayo with fresh whole eggs and just fresh yolks, most recipes are just yolks. If you have power and a stick blender, it's pretty easy. It's possible, but more finicky and time consuming, with a whisk if you don't have power.
Hi EpicenterBryan!
Have you tried these flavors or condiments in a cooked recipe to see how they do in that capacity?
You could reconstitute some of thesewithchickenstockfora good flavor maybe.
Can we find a list of your results anywhere?
a lot of these condiments will store for years in their original form as long as they are stored in dark and cool.........might be easier that spending the time to freeze dry
I'm with you. I also wanted to know what worked and what didn't so I could try to stay away from things in other dishes I plan to try.
totally agree......some condiments seem to work when mixed with other ingredients.......will be testing more things this week....love your videos......
Let me know if you do anything with Mayo. I have a batch of potato salad I made with sour cream (which I know for sure freeze dries) that is ready to go in a batch...
Will do......
I have the same problem of prouncing Worcestershire sauce, so the closest way I can say it is: "what's in this here" sauce...
I haven't dived into the ingredients on that one. What's the most valuable insight you can share as to what causes a "fail" in your mind? And what's up with that Worcestershire sauce and the crazy puffiness?
Felax Chow pronunciations is ‘woostershire’. In England we drop the shire and call it Worcester Sauce
Just a tip somethings that have a really high sugar content don't do so well such as ketchup. Its really hit or miss with ketchup I've seen some work and some not work really depends on the brand you use and its ingredients. As a tip you greatly increase your chances on such items if you dilute them with water allowing them for a more solid freeze. The extra water you add just gets evaporated out anyway. this is most likely the reason the BBQ sauce failed especially since baby rays has such a high sugar content.
Can you tell me what brand works better on the ketchup?
Can't find no mention on youtube about FD'ed Jalapeno peppers!
So it looks like anything with oils or sugars won't work. The ones that are dry could probably be ground down into a powder. Most mustards come in powdered form to make your own. I wonder how many others come in powdered form. The lime juice is 95% water, so all that was left of it was the ascorbic acids, the sugars and the oil from it. Coffee would dehydrate pretty good. You'd probably be left with a foamy (whatever container sized) lump of coffee crystals.
There was a bunch of oil on the heater above the tray, so I'm not 100% sure oil from one item didn't collect above and drip somewhere else on the tray. Some things clearly didn't work though...
Kevin But we FD candy all the time. Gummy bears, Milk Duds, skittles. ALL sugar. So I don’t quite understand it.
high oils and high sugars dont freeze dry. i dont know why?
Has anyone tried putting Christmas candy (peanutter butter balls etc) in the fd?
My grandmother would keep condements in her frig for years ane years and they were fine
Lime juice is Mostly water there should not be much remaining solids.
I can tell you I had my first failure w/Better Than Bullion beef & chicken flavors. It raised up like a cake when you bake it. Made a huge mess in the machine. So stay away from that stuff. Happy to see your experiment so I don't have to do it.
I think that the paper cups is what killed it.
The lime juice probably hit it's triple point and evaporated.
Right now 8-3-17 doing shrimp Argentine wild red and cocktail sauce, wondering how the sauce will turn out!
Let us know! One thing we found out was sauces with High-fructose corn syrup don't work.
will do, be glad to help
Do honey please!!!
Cant understand why anyone would do honey? It lasts forever in its normal state.
There are some honey powders you can order that simulate the taste and last 25 years.. but its not real honey.
Thanks for sharing, I would appreciate the time/ temp settings that you use for all of the experiments that we see. 👍👍👍
Results at 5:18.
The more sugar, the less drying, ruined a lot of sweet pickles that way (I hate sweet ones anyway, that ain't no pickle), am surprised with the relish though.
Why did you take them out of the plastic cups?
I was afraid the cups would melt. The trays get up to 125+ degrees in the freeze drying process.
can you give us a list of just the ones that did work?
Mustard, and half and half was about it. The ketchup was close - and will work with a brand that doesn't have high fructose corn syrup in it. We will try that again when I have time to search for a brand that doesn't have that.
First round the cocktail sauce is way to gummy , will load another batch of shrimp with the sauce
Mayo is mostly oil and eggs
Should have left them in the plastic cups.
Oil n sugars don’t freeze dry well at all
How do you freeze dry coffee?
We will do a video on that soon. We tried it and it worked!
@@EpicenterBryan Thank you!!!
I was waiting for Jen or someone to taste test the dried mustard before you reconstituted it
I don't understand the experiment. Why would you try to freeze dry condiments and not the ingredients for the condiments. If it has water that's fine but you shouldn't freeze dry vinegar..
Sriracha?
how did i find this
No clue, but was it interesting?
Basically, the more salt *_or_* Sugar the slushiest it gets!
I guess peanut butter won't work either. Lots of oil.
i think u need to re do the test using different containers,,,
I know.... So much to freeze dry - so little time.
Most Those things would probably last almost forever anyway
Rehydrate all of it in one bowl and try it haha
Mr. Yuck! With a big barf sticker.
but who uses half and half as a condiment lol
Try fat free half and half. There's lots of fat in regular cream
Will add it to the list.
REDO !!! Too much contamination...
Sherbet is full of gas, kinda like whipped cream
The real problem is with corn syrup. If you can find that item without corn syrup you will have much better results.