Recent content by JD4JC

I've had good luck with freeze-drying peppers (really-really dry!) and pulverizing them into powder that can be dispensed from salt shakers to taste. Below is a picture of a quartet of powders we sent our son who is serving in the USAF in Germany. We've found that about 1/8 tsp of the Ghost is...

Also tried Little Debbie shortbread rollups. Came out good, but the "strawberry" filling squirted out a little bit. Tasted and felt like cotton candy! Easy to scrape off.

Just finishing a batch of freeze-dried Hostess Twinkies for G'Kids stocking stuffers, along with previously F-D ice cream sandwiches. The Twinkies come out amazingly good, sort of like giant fortune cookies!   Merry Christmas!

They don't need to be rehydrated, and are very tasty, but quite different from their prior status! Also, F-D Hostess Twinkies are also quite a treat!

Thanks for the tip! The only downside to freeze drying has been the need to change the oil in the HarvestRight vacuum pump with each batch: I usually spill some somewhere that's hard to clean up, and am needing to use nitrite gloves to keep my hands clean!   So, I sprung for their new oil-less...

The ghost pepper processing went well. I freeze-dried them extensively, and they were very easy to powder in our Ninja processor. I did the deed outside on the deck with a moderate wind blowing away from the processing activity. I was very careful, but did not use any protective gear. I did get...

I freeze dry my ghosts, jalapeños and habaneros, powder them and store them in vacuum jars. I don't think that they will loose any potency for years!

It's properly oriented in my Mac Preview!

Here's an image of ~5 Lb. F-D tomatoes, skins, seeds and all. After drying, we powdered them in a blender, and the powder originally filled the whole quart jar. I guess it rehydrated somewhat and shrunk. HarvestRight told me that with the oxygen absorber and vacuum seal, the dried tomatoes would...

Here are pix of the post freeze-dried results. First photo is the tray out of the dryer, second is of three vac-sealed jars with Ghost Peppers, habaneros and cayenne peppers, waiting for me to gain the courage to powder them.(I don't now why the posting shows the habaneros as orange, as they are...

Just started a small batch of Habaneros Cayenne pods. When done (48 Hrs?) I'll man up and powder them as well as the Ghosts.    

This FoodSaver canning jar sealer works with regular metal canning lids! Also, the vacuum chamber in the VacMaster VP210 is tall enough to accept pint-size canning jars. If you're wanting to go "whole hog," get a HarvestRight freeze dryer: Its vacuum chamber can vacuum seal several quart jars at...

Oxygen absorber packets in a vacuum-sealed jar will keep dehydrated peppers in great shape for years. One of these 100 cc packets should be perfect for a jelly-size vacuum jar, or probably even a pint jar.

I am experimenting with our new HarvestRight freeze-dryer. We FD'd 25 Lb. of fresh tomatoes that a neighbor gave us, powdered the processed wedges and saved into quart canning jars, not vacuumed, but with an oxygen absorber packet in each. The 25# of tomatoes turned into four quarts of powder...

Five full trays. Wow! I only ran about 1/4 of one tray. I guess we have a lot to learn about growing these babies, as the largest one we harvested was less than one inch!   I'd love to know what you do with your dried Ghosts!   [Edit] And I did run a long drying cycle as I also simultaneously...