Can I use my oven to dehydrate?

[Lil Rebel]

I am wanting to start doing my own dehydrating. Am I able to dehydrate simple things such as fruit leathers and banana chips and so forth in my standard oven? If so please tell me what to do and how long.

Thanks
Lil Rebel

[Redbeard]

I'm told you can make bagle chips in the oven. Slice them real thin, soak in butter and herbs(salt for perservetive) bake until toasted and crunchy. I think I'll try this out. Also you can make beef jerky(or any other meat) in the oven, salt and spice, bake at a lower temp for longer time.( I'm a vegetarian so I don't know why I'm telling you this!) Better find a good recipe for Beef Jerky, so you don't get sick.

[chris]

I have not done it (having a machine as I do), but you can dehydrate in an oven. Same principle as a dehydrating machine. Set the over as low as it will go and leave the door partly open. Dried fruit is an easy one to start with. Several people I hiked with last spring had some very good oven dried treats (tomato sauce, etc). Marinated and then dried chunks of tofu work very well and weigh very little. A lot like beef jerky, but works better for things like ramen. Several people had difficulty drying cooked beans, however, using an oven. This isn't a problem with a machine.

Here is a link that you may find useful:

http://www.agen.ufl.edu/~foodsaf/gadry.html

[gravityman]

Might as well get a dehydrator. We got ours for $20 at walmart, although we rarely use it (too lazy). I'm sure there are people here that can recommend the features you need. In the end it might even been cheaper 'cause you won't have to run your oven with the door cracked open for 16 hours.

Gravity man

[Jumpstart]

Hi there,

You can use your oven (we did before we bought our dehydrator) but the crummy thing about the overn vs dehydrator is that you have to stick around at home to watch it, where as we just left our dehydrator on while we were at work all day. Using the oven, just set it to the lowest temperature, put whatever you want to dehydrate on cookie sheets, and even crack the over door open occassioanlly...you just want to be careful not to COOK whatever it is you are trying to dehydrate. There are lots of great tips on the web as well, good luck!

[Gaiter]

this is an old thread, but its still usefull info, does anyone have anyother suggestions/experiences for dehydrating in an oven

my oven goes down to 150*, which has worked for the little bit of dehydrating that i've done, but it took twice as long as any times that i had seen, i was wondering if that was because the air wasn't moving around that much, thinking about finding a fan that won't melt at that temp to get air moving, anybody tried this, or something similar?

[Tennessee Viking]

I am wanting to start doing my own dehydrating. Am I able to dehydrate simple things such as fruit leathers and banana chips and so forth in my standard oven? If so please tell me what to do and how long.

Thanks
Lil Rebel

Fruits are bit tricky because they contain so much moisture.

On the jerky side of dyhydrating, ovens will actually bake it no matter what. But you might want to experiment with it though. The trick is airflow and low temps. Convection ovens will work best. But keep your oven temperature at the lowest or warm, then have a fan in front of the oven to pull out the air.

Alton Brown from Good Eats recommends placing jerky meats on air filters, then using a floor fan on top to pull out the air from the meats.

[Jack Tarlin]

I don't have much personal experience, but I think you've received some good advice....yeah, it CAN be done, but you're probably better off buying an actual dehydrator. I have some good friends that used their kitchen oven, and most of the stuff actually came thru the process pretty well, but their apartment smelled like something large and very unpleasant had died somewhere in the walls or insulation. (This probably describes their abodes BEFORE they started dehydrating as well, but that's another matter).

[Ridgerunner50]

I use to do jerky in the oven all the time. I picked up a couple extra oven racks and covered all four with foil and would also line the bottom of the oven with foil to avoid messy clean-ups. I would set the oven on its lowest setting and wedge a metal spatula in the door to keep it ajar. Sometimes, I would rotate the slelves in the middle of their drying time to get better even drying. Since then, I have purchased 2 American Harvester dehydraters. One can use 12 trays and the larger model can use 20 trays. The better models have temperature controls and fan forced heating that circulates over each tray. I believe you can get one with 4 trays for about $40 or cheaper if you check ebay regularly or your local thrift stores. Good Luck!

[Jim Adams]

I use my oven as well as my 2 dehydrators. The oven will work great for most fruits and jerkys but fairs poorly for other items. You really don't need a fan for your oven but definitely cover the floor of the oven or a bottom rack with foil to catch drips and falling items as they shrink. It can really mess up your oven if not.
2 tips: use round steak for your jerky, cut ALL fat off and slice 1/2 " thick by 4-6" long. marinate over night in the fridge in soy sauce and a tbs. of liquid smoke.
use your oven for drying in the winter...at least it helps to heat your house.

geek

[Fiddleback]

I used a dehydrator once. Given its style and the food I dehydrated clean up was a bother. After that I went back to the oven...the method I first used decades ago.

I dehydrate virtually all my trail meals on a cookie sheet and parchment paper. They are mostly reserved portions from one-pot meals I have at home; spagetti, thick soups, chile, various rice and vegie combinations, etc. This current oven is better than previous ones because it has a convection feature...the air is circulated nicely. But they all have worked fine; gas, electric, electric convection...

I suspect, from what I've read on threads like this one, that dehydrators have some nice features and they turn out good stuff. But in the end, they are merely an improvement on using an oven...perhaps a better way but certainly not the only way. There is presumably some convenience to be had in using them but I like the clean-up convenience of the cookie sheet/oven combination. And clean-up convenience is the main reason I do freezer bag cooking/dehydrated food in the first place.

However... ...if you do a lot of dehydrating you might want to consider a purpose-built appliance.

FB

[hiker5]

Fiddleback's comments about all types of ovens being adaquate got me thinking. Has anyone noticed that using a gas oven takes any longer than say an electric? I'd assume a convection oven would have a clear advantage, but I'm thinking gas verse electric. I would think that the "wet heat" in a gas oven would cause slower dehydration rates. My understanding is that the gas provides a "wet heat" since water is a byproduct of the combustion process. I'm surely not saying that i wouldn't work, but it might work slower.

[Midway Sam]

Fiddleback's comments about all types of ovens being adaquate got me thinking. Has anyone noticed that using a gas oven takes any longer than say an electric? I'd assume a convection oven would have a clear advantage, but I'm thinking gas verse electric. I would think that the "wet heat" in a gas oven would cause slower dehydration rates. My understanding is that the gas provides a "wet heat" since water is a byproduct of the combustion process. I'm surely not saying that i wouldn't work, but it might work slower.

Hopefully this is not considered a threadjack but my wife just bought a Nuwave oven. She was told about it by someone at her gastric bypass support group. It's basically a countertop convection oven.

It works GREAT for dehydration. I have done bananas and ground beef so far and it worked like a charm and was quite efficient.

https://www.nuwaveoven.com/

[hiker5]

Here is a link to Alton Browns recipe featured on Good Eats. I'll have to try this some day.

[hiker5]

Here is a video of the contraption.

[Doctari]

I use my oven all the time to dry food. The key is an oven you can turn the heat down very low, AND you must, that is: MUST prop the oven door open. The door dosn't need to be open very far, I use a baby's fork (about 3" long) to prop the door on my gas oven open. I have never had any problems using the oven. My dehydrators usually take 12 to 24 hrs to dry what the oven can do in about 8 to 14.

As stated above, you can't just "set it & forget it" like you can a dehydrator.

A reminder: if you over dry tomates or any thing with tomatoes in it, it WILL taste burned! MMM, smoked pasta sauce

[Gaiter]

with the door propped open what temperature do you use?

[Fiddleback]

Hiker5 and Doctari are right...there's more moisture when using a gas oven but all ovens' doors must be propped open to evacuate the moisture that is drawn from the food. The conventional wisdom is that, even with their door propped open, the ovens are set at their lowest. One key to dehydrating food is to not rush things by having the heat too high and most ovens' lowest settings are still higher than most dehydrators. These considerations are some of the advantages that dehydrators have over ovens.

Thinking over my own comments above I remember making only jerky in a gas oven. This wasn't because there were inherent problems with it...I wasn't backpacking or into dehydrated food at the time. But the jerky always came out great!

FB

[Doctari]

with the door propped open what temperature do you use?

The knobby thing reads 140 as the lowest setting, but once it is lit, you can turn it down much lower. I don't have a thermometer so don't know how low it goes. It is a bit hotter than I can stand having my hand on for very long, but I get the trays out without gloves, no problem, so I'm thinking under 120 but over 100. This is WAY higher than a dehydrator gets, but if you are watchful, it's not a bad way to dry foods. I suppose you could turn on the heat, then off at regular intervals if you want, & maybe with an electric that may be the way to go, I have never used an electric oven so don't know.