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6 Rectangular Tray Food Dehydrator, 550W $39 Delivered @ Kogan

130
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Cheapest it's ever been according to Pricehipster, and now with free shipping.

I researched yesterday and only the postage stopped me from buying then. Thanks to nocure for the free shipping code here!

TLDR: this IMHO is the best value for money dehydrator

Long version:
At this price point all other models I saw are a lot smaller with lower wattage.
You'd have to spend $100 or more to find something significantly better: with horizontal air flow instead of the vertical air flow of this one.

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  • +1

    Is there any health benefits or risks to this? A quick search seems to all turn up shopping sites or pseudo-wellness sites. Anyone come across actual research on this?

      • +1

        That'd be one of the pseudo-wellness sites.

    • +1

      I guess eating dried fruit is better than eating Starburst. Besides that it's just a good way to make tasty snacks. Dried fruit, homemade jerky flavours, black garlic, powdered ingredients from liquids.

      • +5

        Actually, its like drinking fruit juice instead of soft drink in the belief that it's "natural" there fore good for you. You eat a lot more then you would with whole fruits, so your get a lot of sugar (which is concentrated and a much higher percentage of the product). The higher % of sugar concentration means higher calories. The dehydration process also kills off some vitamins & minerals. Such as Vitamin C & A

        Don't fall for the natural = healthy fallacy.

        https://extension2.missouri.edu/gh1562

        • The higher % of sugar concentration means higher calories.

          Higher calories as a function of volume/weight. Same number of calories in a "smaller" amount of food.

    • +1

      Main health risk is if you don't have it on a high enough temperature when drying meat, that being said I've been making jerky for years and have never had an issue using the standard 'high' setting on any dehydrator. Home made roll-ups are easy to make with a blender, sugar, and whatever fruit you want, not overly healthy but less artificial.

      • +1

        What do you use to lay the homemade Rollups on while they sit on the tray of the dehydrator?

        • +1

          I don't have this model but mine came with a reusable plastic sheet for the bottom rack, you can use baking paper and then flip it once it's set enough to ensure that it's dried to your liking on both sides.

          • +1

            @LazyBear: Thanks for that. I wasn't sure if it had to be some sort of mesh to allow for air to get to the bottom of it, but I guess flipping would work too

            • +1

              @Lizard Spock: All good, the consistency and thickness dictates how easy it is to set and flip, bit of gelatin would probably help even more but if the puree is basically like jam and the thickness of a roll-up it should be pretty easy

      • I only use high which is marked as 70degreeC. Takes 11 hours to dehydrate peas, 20 hrs for celery, as examples. You can do 2 or 3 kilos of veges at a time.

        • 20 x 550w = 11000w = 11kw x .25 = $2.75. / 3kg = < $1kg before dehydration. Likely to be about $4-5 per kilo of end product

          • @itshammer: Mines 250W so Kogans should work much faster.

    • @clubhonda

      I use one regularly (eg. all day yesterday & today) to dehydrate peas, celery, sauerkraut etc, then powder in blender, leaving powder dry for a week, lengthy boil 30+ mins, then freeze for a week, to neuter many veges so I don't react with inflammation, immune reactions. 25 years sick, and well now for good.
      So there ARE possible health benefits.
      I know about loss of vitamins etc, but the one I bought off ebay works great.

      https://www.ebay.com.au/itm/5-Trays-BPA-Free-Food-Dehydrator…
      Cost ~$36 with discounts

      • I had one very similar to the one you linked. It worked fine, so good actually that my ex claimed it when she moved out. I've just ordered this one as a replacement. For very little extra $ it gives a lot more area to work with. No idea how well it works, but the reviews were decent enough to give it a shot.

        • I find you have to rotate trays every few hours. Also the ebay one shuts off every 5 hours which is not great.

          • @[Deactivated]: The ones with horizontal airflow supposedly avoid the need to rotate, but the price is a lot higher.
            If I'd be willing to spend $142 I'd have gone for this model here. Stainless steel should make it easy to clean and durable.
            A tad cheaper and a brand-name, but all pastic is this Sunbeam for $133.
            Most rack space for money would have been this for $117.

            I thought I pass on those links as it appears you use yours a lot. Maybe time to upgrade?

  • +1

    How easy is it to make jerky using one ofthese?

    • +3

      Cut meat
      Marinade overnight
      Put meat in dehydrator
      Flip after 2 hours so it doesn't stick
      Turn it off between 5-8 hours in depending on how dry you want it.

      Aside from flipping once it's basically set and forget

      • What temperature do you use?

        • +1

          Most have low, medium, and high, their version of high is about 60c-70c to make sure you've killed everything except the flavour

    • +1

      I use a similar one to this, and it has been going well for a long time. The only thing that is a pain no matter what, is slicing the meat to marinate and then cutting up the jerky once done. But I was doing a batch of this every night to sell at work, good fun and very popular.

  • I usually use my oven for jerky, but clean up and smell is a bit of a pain. As this has plastic Trays I assume clean up would be even worse? If I was to buy this purely for jerky, thoughts?

    • I use a similar one, as long as you have a dishwasher that can handle it it's easy as. Only thing is cleaning out the bottom pretty regularly, because that's where it congeals and then dries.

      Anything that's just a dry rub though is easy as.

      • Thx

      • could you use cooking paper or would that eventually burn?

  • Here's a question for OzBargain's finest - any suggestions for a mod to this that would circulate the air to a point that I wouldn't need to rotate the trays?

    • Nothing. I have tried a few of these vertically stacked units and found them very inconsistent. I've had a horizontally sliding tray unit for many years now - from eBay, twin fan, 13 trays I think, probably around $120 or so if I remember right - and it is like day compared to night. I would not recommend a vertical stack unit unless you have a specific reason for it (eg: only do 1 tray at a time).

      • Can you link to yours? Thx

        • I got mine years ago, but looks pretty much like this except mine has more (12? 13? 15? trays - not sure.)

      • Where are the fans that make the air circulate better? No reason why I cant simulate that with my current set up to get air moving around better.

        • The fans are at the back, so all trays get unimpeded air flow - like multiple channels of flow. With a vertical stack it's always one channel of air flow, one end is always further from the fan than the other, and the closest to the fan cops the humid air from the other layers. It might work well for some, never worked well for me for the things I do. (fruits, veg, kale chips, crackers. I've even dried my shoes in it a couple of times)

  • This should pair well with the meat slicer for $25. It's not the best machine, but if you freeze the meat slightly, it should make slicing it much easier.
    https://www.ozbargain.com.au/node/490734

    • Should be fine for a while, but the motor deteriorates quite quickly in my experience. Better off trying to get a butcher to slice for you, which is what I am going to do.

    • I did exactly that.

  • is this dishwasher safe?

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