The Dehydrated Ground Meat Meal Thread

[kgd]

I'm starting to plan my menu for a 15 night trip to the Boreal forest this august. We make all our own dehydrated food but like variety to rotate from day to day without it feeling like we keep eating the same thing. I thought I'd start this thread to see what ideas people have for 'do-it-yourself- ground meat style dehydrated dishes. I mostly use lean ground beef, but ground chicken and pork (well rinsed after cooked) work well also. I don't find actual meat chunks aside from jerky re-hydrate well and in my experience it is best to purchase these as freeze dried items (which I avoid). Here is our standard list of ground meat based meals:

1) Chilli
2) Meat pasta sauce with Penne
3) Faux fajita - beans, hamburger, cilantro, rice, onions, peppers and fajita mix
4) Shepard's pie (Becky's favorite) with instant mashed potatoes, we put the ketchup in the meat before dehydrating
5) Lazy man cabbage rolls - cabbage re-hydrates really nicely, add some wild rice to make it stand out
6) Yellow rice, burger and vegetables; or variations on rice/meat and bean dishes
7) Beef stroganoff - ground beef, packaged gravy, eggs noodles, dehydrated mushrooms and onions
8) Moroccan tangene - root vegetable based - difficult to make but delicious

....and what else could we make?

 

[Mikel_24]

Sounds interesting.... and tasty! Could you please elaborate the process of dehydrating for those not familiar with it? Ok ok, I KNOW what it is, but I have never done it myself or seeing it done by anyone else I knew.

Do you have access to a dedicated appliance for this process?

Thanks!

 

[Grease]

Sounds interesting.... and tasty! Could you please elaborate the process of dehydrating for those not familiar with it? Ok ok, I KNOW what it is, but I have never done it myself or seeing it done by anyone else I knew.

Do you have access to a dedicated appliance for this process?

Thanks!

You can technically dehydrate a lot of things in an oven set at the lowest temperature for a day.

 

[kgd]

Sounds interesting.... and tasty! Could you please elaborate the process of dehydrating for those not familiar with it? Ok ok, I KNOW what it is, but I have never done it myself or seeing it done by anyone else I knew.

Do you have access to a dedicated appliance for this process?

Thanks!

Hi Mikel,

As Grease said, you can dehydrate in an oven. Set it at 170 degrees F and give it overnight and you are good to go, try not to go higher than that. However, there are many commercial dehydrator's available at Wallmart, Costco and restaurant supply stores that have dedicated dehydrator units that are plug and go and all you to expand your surface area for dehydrating. The gold standard is the Excalibre series of dehydrators, I use one by the company called Nelson. Better dehydrators have the ability to adjust temperatures from 130 degrees F to 170 degrees F; use the lower temp for herbs and veggies and the higher temps for meat.

Food prep - for beef jerky the key is the marinade. The beef is placed raw in the marinade usually over 24-48 h and then dehydrated without cooking. There are a tonne of recipe's available for beef jerky. I like this one: https://www.allrecipes.com/recipe/142948/docs-best-beef-jerky/ - skip the salt, and I sub the paprika for cayenne pepper for added spicyness. You can do this one in the oven or a dedicated dehydrator.

For one pot meals, I generally cook the meal as I would normally do and eat some of it fresh from cooking. I reserve 2 cups wet per person per meal and simply load it onto parchment paper cut to fit the dehydrator tray shape and dehydrate for 12 h at 170 degrees F until it is crispy. Scrape everything off and add it to a ziplock bag, label and you are done. For pasta's, you can do just the sauce. For recipes with mashed potatoes, buy the powdered mash potatoes and leave on the side then dehydrate the main stuffing part. On rehydrating, you pre-boil water, remove and reserve. Then add your dehydrated food to the pot plus about 1/3 cup of water at a time. Simmer and let the food absorb the water, add until the right texture and consistency. Don't add all the water at once as you might add to much and you will have a soup or stew rather than a meal.

Here's a couple of videos I made a few years back

 

[JoberSeven]

thanks for sharing. i look forward to trying the shepherds pie.

 

[Mikel_24]

Thanks a lot for the information! I will try to do that in my kitchen oven... and will report back! Unless something blows up.

 

[hank_rearden]

That Texas- (or is it cowboy-)style chili wherein the whole thing is spiced dry and rehydrated in the pot is intriguing. must take 3 hours to simmer.