The Procedure of Freeze-Drying
Freeze-drying is a sophisticated method of preserving clean or already-cooked foods by removing up to ninety eight% of the food’s moisture, leaving intact the food’s texture, taste, aroma and nutritional price.
The procedure requires that the fresh or cooked foodstuff be swiftly frozen at temperatures as low as -50°C. The frozen foods is then placed into a vacuum chamber. This vacuum chamber lowers the strain, and raises the temperature to just about 0°C.
At this specific temperature and stress, the ice crystals in the foods evaporate into drinking water vapor, bypassing water’s liquid sort, through a method named sublimation.
This method preserves the mobile construction and dietary content of the meals, ensuing in a item that, when rehydrated, really closely resembles the original foods.
The procedure also prevents the h2o from becoming reabsorbed by the foodstuff and thus decreases its fat significantly.
Most foodstuff objects this kind of as fruits, greens and meats are well-suited to freeze-drying, and can be utilized for long-phrase foods storage and preservation.
The Procedure of Dehydration
Dehydrating meals is a food preservation strategy which has been employed for generations. Indigenous Americans dehydrated their buffalo kills in their searching camps to make it less complicated to transport. Pemmican (a dehydrated concoction of buffalo meat combined with fat and berries) was a staple of many of the nomadic North American tribes. This lower-warmth dehydration method associated possibly air drying (with nearby campfires), or sunshine drying strips of meat on drying racks.
Dehydrators are a modern day approach for little by little getting rid of the dampness from food with out truly cooking it. A downside of dehydration is the constrained quantity of meals which can be dried at 1 time. The positive facet of dehydration is that this strategy of processing for foods storage can be very easily accomplished at residence.
How Do These Two Methods Impact the Foods?
Freeze-dried food items protect significantly of the unique shade, shape, aroma and freshness of fruits, veggies and meats. Freeze-dried foods does not typically incorporate additives or preservatives, so it continues to be accurate to its authentic kind. And the seem, texture and taste of the food continues to be following re-hydration.
Unlike reduced-heat dehydration, freeze-drying permits for the preservation of pre-cooked foods, which includes recipes such as soups, stews, stroganoff, and the like. An evident gain is that since the food was well prepared in its entirety prior to freeze-drying, all you need to have to do is just add h2o, then warmth for a handful of minutes in order to produce sumptuous foods.
Rehydrating freeze-dried food normally takes just a handful of minutes, simply by including boiling drinking water. Some meals, like many fruits and greens, want no re-hydration ahead of eating.
Dehydrated food items shrink in the course of processing as the moisture is eliminated. So the food product by itself is substantially more compact than its unique dimension.
The re-hydration time of dehydrated foodstuff takes a little bit more time than freeze-dried, but it stills tastes like the original sort of the foodstuff. Some dehydrated foodstuff incorporate extra components to increase flavors or assist in preservation. As with freeze-dried fruits and greens, dehydrated fruits and greens can be eaten without having any re-hydration.
Equally techniques of food preservation boost the prolonged-term storage existence of foods. Most commercially produced freeze-dried and dehydrated food items have a shelf daily life of fifteen to 20 several years, if properly packaged and stored in a awesome, dry setting.
In addition to their currently being a reliable supply of food in an crisis or lengthy-term survival situation, since of their light-weight fat and ease of portability, these food items are also wonderful for having on tenting, hiking and hunting outings. They are also a sensible choice to hold in an crisis street-aspect package for the vehicle, or in your bug out bag.
If you decide on to preserve these food items in your vehicle as element of an emergency kit, make sure you bear in mind to rotate them periodically. Temperatures in a automobile can attain extremes, equally hot and cold. Substantial heat as effectively as ongoing temperature fluctuations add to more quickly degradation of each dehydrated and freeze-dried foodstuff.
Which Sort is Greater for Use?
Every person is distinct, and each and every particular person has their possess private preferences and choices. With that in brain, there are a few items to consider just before creating a determination between freeze-dried or dehydrated food.
Residence-grown fruits and veggies are much better preserved via dehydration, considering that the common particular person cannot pay for the expensive machinery used in freeze-drying.
Food items utilized in everyday cooking and meal planning ought to almost certainly be freeze-dried. This permits the foodstuff to be quickly re-hydrated as it is cooked prior to serving. If accessibility and portability are important, than either kind of preserved food should meet those distinct requirements. As soon as yet again, it really is a subject of personal choices.
In Farmeks , equally dehydrated and freeze-dried foods are outstanding alternatives for long-expression food storage, as effectively as for daily use or for hiking, camping, and many others. They the two provide gentle-bodyweight, transportable, hassle-free foodstuff. The primary big difference is that freeze-dried meals are inclined to much better maintain the condition, texture and flavors of the unique meals.
Most individuals will locate that a mix will operate best for their demands. One-product food items this sort of as veggies, potatoes, and other staples and grains are nicely-suited to reduced-heat dehydration. Freeze-drying is more proper for meats and fruits (whose texture can be preserved), and for pre-cooked foods with a range of elements this sort of as soups, stews and sauces.
