Food Dehydrator vs. Freeze Dryer – Which Is Better?

by | Guides & info

Food dehydrator VS Freeze Dryer
Do you love food? Of course you do, but to what extent? If you’re prepared to do everything to have the freshest ingredients and vegetables in your menu, then you probably use a food dehydrator or freeze dryer. Both products allow storing food and keeping them fresh for a long period. This way you can have every type of vegetables on your plate throughout the year, no matter what season it is. But which product is better at keeping the vegetable, meat or any other ingredient to your dish fresh? To find out let’s compare the two products and let the facts decide which one is the winning product, shall we?

Storing Food with Dehydrator

So what is food dehydrator, exactly? This unique product that you can find at any better-equipped store allows you to remove the water from the vegetables or any other food product so that it can be stored for longer periods. This can be done by freezing the fare in your freezer. So the process is really that simple but how fresh will your vegetables be once they’re removed from the freezer?
dried mashrooms
By preparing your food for storing it, you’ll make almost every food type available during the whole year. And not only that, but you’ll notice that once your remove and defrost it, your vegetable still has its unique taste and smell. The only catch is that they won’t be as fresh as the day you got them from the store. By fresh we mean that they won’t be full of water. The reason for this is because of the whole process of dehydration.

Dehydrating and Desiccating

Food dehydrator removes the water from your fare so that you can store it in the freezer. But why it’s important to remove the water from food? Vegetable, dairy and meat tends to spoil over time. Food spoilage happens when certain chemicals reactions occur in the fare as a result of bacteria attack. There are two main factors that allow bacteria to attack enzymes and reduce the quality of your food so that it becomes inedible. One is temperature as bacteria become active only at specific temperatures. The other factor is moisture or water in your fare. So by removing both factors for food spoilage, you’ll prolong its lifespan.

By dehydrating fare, you’ll remove most of the water in it. This will considerably postpone the expiry date. However, if you want to be completely sure that your fare doesn’t get spoiled,  you’ll need to desiccate it.

food dehydrator

Desiccation is a process of completely removing the water from fare. This will transform your fresh fare into dry fare. And we all know that dry food simply can’t spoil.

So to sum it up. By using a food dehydrator, you’ll transform your fresh ingredients into dry ingredients. They will keep their nutritional value, except that they won’t be fresh anymore. But this doesn’t mean that they wouldn’t smell, taste or have the same structure as fresh fare. If your prefer this method of preparing food for long term storage but still aren’t convinced that your fare will be nutritious, you can find out all about dry fare nutritional value in this article.

Freeze Dryer

What is freeze drying you may ask? Only one of the best ways to keep your food fresh and edible over a long period of time. The main concept of freeze drying your fare is to freeze the fare and then change the pressure in the surrounding air so that the water in your food changes from solid state to gas chemical state. So the concept for food storage remains the same. The water from your food will become parish as it transforms from liquid to solid, and then finally to a gas chemical state. This way you’ll remove the two factors that allow bacteria to spread, multiply and decrease the quality of your fare.
freeze food

Freeze drying process is also known as lyophilisation and cryodesiccation. If you want to learn more about this process, you may inquire here. The process of lyophilization is mostly used in food industry as it’s mainly intended for food transportation on a large scale. It makes the material compact and in a perfect state for transport. But using this process to store fare in your home is also advisable. Not only that you’ll have all the ingredients for every dish that you make but you’ll also keep its nutritional value intact even though its frozen for a long time.

How to Use Freeze Dryer

Using freeze dryer is fairly simple. All you need to do is cut your food into smaller bits and chunks so that it can fit in the freeze dryer. Once you’ve done that, all you need to do is modify the temperature that you want to keep your food in, and start the process of cryodesiccation. This machine will automatically and simultaneously freeze your stored items and change its structure so that the water parishes from it. The technique was invented early in the 20th century by Jacques-Arsene d’Arsonval and his assistant Frederic Bordas. Since then we’ve found various uses for implementing this process in the food industry as well as other businesses.
freeze dryer

To Conclude

If the topic of food dehydrator vs. freeze dryer still resonated in your mind, you’ll want to know the answer to the question of superiority in these two products. Although both variations of food processing have features, the question about nutritional value becomes obvious.

Is fare processed with food dehydrator healthier than that processed by freeze dryer? Being that food dryer keeps the chemical structure mostly intact, and that it’s more suitable for individual use, processing food this way is more advisable than with freeze dryer. But we’ve only stated the facts and features of both products; it’s on you to decide which one suits you best. If you don’t want to go through the whole process of drying the fare then placing it into freezer you can use freeze dryer. However, if you prefer to keep the nutritional value of your food intact, you should use food dehydrators to process your vegetable and meat and prepare it for long term storage. It’s as simple as that.

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