I have a freeze dryer. AMA.
How many e.g. eggs can you freeze-dry at once? What's the most and least value freeze-dry product? How much energy does your device consume?
I think we can do around 120 eggs in one batch. 4 trays and about 30 eggs per tray.
The least value item is water. Freeze dry it and you get zilch. Highest value food you could feeeze dry is probably meats. You want to know a freeze dry surprise? Krab sticks. They freeze dry and reconstitute very well.
Energy consumed varies according to the stage it's at in the cycle . It draws for the vacuum pump, freeze coil and tray warmers, and if they are all going at once its a big load. Sometimes a full cycle start to end takes 15 or 20 hours if there is low moisture content in the food and stuff is already frozen. For example ice cream sandwiches. Or a cycle can take 50 hours, if its all liquid like raw scrambled eggs. It varies considerably based on whats being freeze dried.
Pro tip : Don't freeze dry onions.
Well, tell us the best things to free dry for long term storage. I have enough dry food to last over a year. But I have often thought about buying one of these things.
When I say to last over a year, I mean that I don't have to go to the store to buy food for over a year. If the shit hits the fan (you know, like next week) then I can shut my door and not have to participate in the shutdown. House and cars are paid off. Shelter, Food, Water, Guns, Bullets. We're good over here.
We're largely set as well. We could have SHTF tomorrow and we'd be better off than 95% of the folks out there. Do you have any solar panels?
The principle reason we bought one is to freeze dry stuff we grow/produce on our land. At the height of summer, our hens produce way more eggs than we can consume or sell. We freeze dry the surplus eggs and they are shelf stable for ~25 years. Fruit is very popular to freeze dry and tastes great.
In a prepping mindset, there are 3 major food preservation methods: dehydrate, canning, and freeze drying. Different foodstuffs respond differently to different preservation methods. For example, you can freeze dry shredded cheese and it turns out great, but you really can't dehydrate shredded cheese.