When selecting a food dehydrator, you’ll find that they come in many sizes & shapes. Hailed by food connoisseurs as being one of the best and healthiest ways to preserve food and add some variety to your diet, food dehydrators have become increasingly more popular over the years. They carry a number of health benefits, and can help you avoid the multitude of chemicals that are often added in commercially sold dried vegetables and fruits.
A number of studies have shown that these toxins can cause quite a few medical conditions such as elevated blood pressure or various forms of cancer. Therefore, a food dehydrator can help you to create your own organic treats without having to spend a ton of your hard earned. There are a number of things you have to consider when shopping for a food dehydrator. All food dehydrators will do the job they were made for, which is to dehydrate foods. This will not only preserve your food, but it will also bring out the flavors in it as well. However, some units are better suited for certain applications than others.
After painstakingly analyzing, reviewing and comparing a number of different food dehydrators, we chose three units that we consider to be the cream of the crop.
Best Overall: Excalibur 3926TB Food Dehydrator
The Excalibur 3926TB is, in our opinion, the best food dehydrator currently on the market. It is our top pick and we give it our highest recommendation. The Excalibur comes with 9 spacious trays, making it great for people who have a large family and who need to dry a lot of food in one go. While it is not expandable, its capacity is more than enough for 99{88454e838380835437410b8dd4980e42836d50c1d7c06d32c28ecbc57e5157a9} of families. The trays can be removed for smaller drying jobs or when you want to dry items that are bigger in size.
This machine will allow you to easily make beef jerky or fruit rolls, along with tasty, mouth-watering, organic snacks. This isn’t a dehydrator you have to constantly manage and keep an eye on, as you can leave your food in the dehydrator tray for hours, drying your food without having to do anything else to it. Its built-in timer will allow you to run the dehydrator for up to 25 hours. This added level of convenience provides worry free drying.
The Excalibur uses a horizontal airflow system with the fan in the back of the unit. Its patented parallax horizontal airflow system will allow you to dehydrate your food relatively quickly, as the unit distributes the heat evenly throughout each tray, all without you having to do any tray rotation. The Excalibur is designed to prevent yeast, mold and potential spoilage from occurring, keeping your dried food products healthy and safe to eat for a long period of time.
Best Value: Nesco FD-75A Snackmaster Pro Food Dehydrator
The Nesco FD-75A Snackmaster is a 5 tray, cylindrically shaped food dehydrator that is made out of plastic in a light-grey color. If you’re looking to get the best bang for your buck, then the Nesco is the one you want. Manufactured by the Metal Ware Corporation out of Wisconsin, the Nesco Snackmaster is one of the best selling food dehydrators on Amazon. The company has been in business in the U.S. since the early 1900’s, and currently operates 3 manufacturing facilities along Lake Michigan in Wisconsin.
The Nesco uses a top mounted fan and a powerful 600-watt heating element assembly that you can easily remove for cleaning. This gives the Nesco a big advantage over dehydrators with bottom-mounted fans, as the juices from the food will not drip down into the heating element. This makes cleanup much simpler, since the food drippings will not burn onto the heating unit. Moreover, this adds an element of safety for the same reason.
The fan system is a patented design called “Converga-flow”. The way it works is that air from the fan is forced down a separate chamber located around the outside of the container area. Air is then channeled into chambers that carry it across the food in the drying trays. This allows the trays to hold different types of food without causing flavors to mix with each other.
Best Budget Model: Presto 06300 Dehydro Food Dehydrator
Priced very affordably, the Presto 06300 Dehydro has garnered hundreds of positive reviews from Amazon and other online vendors, mainly due to its ease of use. This food dehydrator comes with a 4 tray system that will allow you to dehydrate a considerable amount of fruits and vegetables in a single batch. Users will also appreciate the see-through cover that will help you keep a close watch on the dehydrating process, and this will also help to prevent you from under drying or over drying your food. As a nice addition, the cover and drying trays can be submerged in water for easy cleaning. Dishwasher-friendly, this unit can also be used to make chicken or beef jerky, as well as fruit leather.
The Presto Dehydro is also very easy-to-clean, and does not make a lot of noise during the dehydrating process. It’s also very lightweight, allowing you to easily move it to any desired room of your house. It’s also very versatile, as it can even be used for different purposes such as drying pinecones or flowers. The only drawback is the lack of temperature control, but overall it’s a great machine for beginners who have never used a dehydrator before and aren’t ready to invest a lot money in a high-end dehydrator yet.
How They Compare
Capacity
Excalibur 3926TB
The Excalibur dehydrator is quite large and can hold up to 9 trays (15 sq. ft. of drying space), giving it a very large capacity. It is 17″ x 19″ and weighs a little over 20 lbs., making this dehydrator one of the larger ones on the market.
Presto 06300 Dehydro
The Presto dehydrator has a rather modest tray count of just 4. However, it can be expanded to hold up to 8 trays (approx. 9 sq. ft. of drying space). It measures about 15″ across and weighs about 8 lbs., so it is fairly small and portable compared to a lot of the dehydrators out there.
Nesco FD-75A Snackmaster
The Nesco dehydrator comes with 5 trays, but can be expanded to up to a whopping twelve trays. This is one of the most expandable dehydrators that we came across. It weighs about 6 lbs. and is about 14″ across, making it fairly compact and easy to store.
Efficiency & Heat Distribution
Excalibur 3926TB
The Excalibur dehydrator a fan that is mounted at the rear of the unit and utilizes “horizontal airflow” to dry food. This dehydration method distributes hot air very evenly throughout the unit’s trays, which minimizes flavor mixing and gives you very consistent results every time you use it. This machine will allow you to make about 5 lbs. of beef jerky in about 7 hours.
Presto 06300 Dehydro
The Presto dehydrator has a bottom mounted fan uses vertical airflow to dry food. This is a very efficient dehydration method, since heat rises, and allows for slightly faster drying times. However, one disadvantage of this method of dehydration is that it tends to dry foods near the bottom faster than foods near the top. It can also occasionally result in “flavor mixing” if you dry many different types of food at one time.
Nesco FD-75A Snackmaster
The Nesco dehydrator has a top mounted fan which the company calls the Converga-Flow system. This unique design reduces the chance of flavor mixing that can occur with dehydrators with base-mounted fans, although it doesn’t completely eliminate it.
Features
Excalibur 3926TB
The Excalibur dehydrator has easy to use temperature controls with a built-in 26 hour timer. Its adjustable thermostat can allow you to set a temperature of anywhere between 105 and 165 degrees. Additionally, no tray rotation is required with this machine. Its seven inch fan produces 440 watts worth of heat.
Presto 06300 Dehydro
The Presto dehydrator doesn’t have a slew of features, but it does have a clear lid which allows you to easily check on the progress of your food. The trays are dishwasher safe, making cleanup relatively simple. One downside, though, is that it does not have a timer nor does it allow you adjust the temperature. This may be a deal breaker for some people who like having that extra degree of control.
Nesco FD-75A Snackmaster
The Nesco Dehydrator comes with a number of accessories including 2 mesh sheets, 2 solid sheets, 3 packets of jerky spices, and also comes with a very useful recipe book that will give you hundreds of ideas for dried food. It also has a built-in carrying handle for added convenience.
Value For Money Spent
Excalibur 3926TB
With a price that is about three times that of the average dehydrator on the market, this is certainly not the cheapest dehydrator around. Is it worth it, though? Absolutely. This is an American made appliance that has a 10 year warranty and is superbly built and constructed. This machine was built to last, and products like these don’t come cheap.
Presto 06300 Dehydro
With a price of almost half that of the Nesco FD-75A, the Presto dehydrator is a bargain. It’s a great entry level model and is perfect for people who live alone or only intend to dry food every once in a while. However, if you have a large family or plan to do some serious food drying at home, then we would recommend stepping up to a bigger-sized model. It comes with a 1 year warranty and is fairly decently made.
Nesco FD-75A Snackmaster
The Nesco dehydrator is priced right around the average for a home food dryer, but its value is anything but average. Its Converga-flow system prevents flavor mixing and its unique design allows for very fast drying. Additionally, its top-mounted fan makes cleanup much easier, since food drippings don’t fall into it like dehydrators with bottom mounted fans.
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