dehydrators Dehydrator wattage

chillilover

chillilover

I want to buy a dehydrator and don't want to spend much. There is a salton at walmart that is a set temp of 95F. Can I use this to dry peppers okay? I don't mind if it takes a little longer.
 
chillilover said:
I want to buy a dehydrator and don't want to spend much. There is a salton at walmart that is a set temp of 95F. Can I use this to dry peppers okay? I don't mind if it takes a little longer.
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You can dry them with a box and a light bulb or the oven set on low temps, but 95F seems a little low and would probably take several days.

How much is the Wally World unit?
 
I have an American Harvester and the spice setting is around 195
so I turn it down somewhere around 150 and it still takes 2-3 days to dry peppers.
 
I have this unit and at most it takes a day and a half set at 135F and that's only when I have all 9 of my trays loaded. With six trays loaded and no thick fleshed stuff like poblanos, it takes a day or a little less.

But I cut all chiles in half.
 
pappywith4 said:
I have an American Harvester and the spice setting is around 195
so I turn it down somewhere around 150 and it still takes 2-3 days to dry peppers.
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Pappy, don't you mean the spice setting is 95F?
 
Silver_Surfer said:
You can dry them with a box and a light bulb or the oven set on low temps, but 95F seems a little low and would probably take several days.

How much is the Wally World unit?
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$39
 
I'd personally avoid the Salton since it looks like the Ronco or Mr. coffee type with no temp control. The other problem is with the trays melting and warping over time, although it may be a better unit than the one I used many years ago.
 
pappywith4 said:
No it says herbs and spice 195 !!:)
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Hmmm... mine says 95F for herbs and spices and the max temp setting is 160F.


chillilover said:
$39
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For the difference in price I'd get a good dehydrator with variable temp control, (Nesco's FD_75PR is the best bang for your buck IMO) even if that meant drying in the oven for now until you could afford it.
 
I have a Nesco FD-61 500 watt and it works great. I dry at 125-130F and it takes 10-16 hrs with 4 trays full. It's been working overtime lately.
 
Another thing nice about the Nesco units is that when you finally burn out the unit, you don't have to go out n buy another whole dehydrator. It took
me almost 5 years to burn out the first Nesco. Which runs almost 24/7, for 4 months a year. I contacted the manufacturer n they sent me just the heating element/fan at 1 third the cost of a complete new one.
 
Silver_Surfer said:
Hmmm... mine says 95F for herbs and spices and the max temp setting is 160F.




For the difference in price I'd get a good dehydrator with variable temp control, (Nesco's FD_75PR is the best bang for your buck IMO) even if that meant drying in the oven for now until you could afford it.
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Is the fd80 better? I can't find the fd-75R in Canada. The FD80 is $104 taxes and shipping included.
 
Silver_Surfer said:
I have this unit and at most it takes a day and a half set at 135F and that's only when I have all 9 of my trays loaded. With six trays loaded and no thick fleshed stuff like poblanos, it takes a day or a little less.

But I cut all chilies in half.
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i have almost the same exact model, mine just doesn't have that nifty handle
 
chillilover said:
Actually the salton at walmart is 80C bottom tray and 70C top which is 176F bottom and 158F top. Would that be okay?
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Too hot and no way to adjust it.

The Nesco dries fairly evenly from top to bottom and no need to rotate trays. Get a good one and use it for years.
 
Silver_Surfer said:
Too hot and no way to adjust it.

The Nesco dries fairly evenly from top to bottom and no need to rotate trays. Get a good one and use it for years.
Click to expand...

What about the oven method? How do I go about that?
 
chillilover said:
What about the oven method? How do I go about that?
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If you have a convection oven you've got it whipped; otherwise, set the oven as low as it will go, keep the door slightly ajar, place the pods on a wire mesh rack in the middle of the oven and check/stir/rotate the pods once every hour or so.
 
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