The Dehydrator Batch and Cost Planner

How much produce to buy for the dried food you want, the trays and whole runs it takes, what the power costs at your rate, and whether it beats the store

DryHarvest's Batch Yield Estimator turns a fresh weight into a dried range, and its own help text says the question it leaves open is the one you have at the market: how much do I buy to end up with the dried food I want? The Rehydration Ratio Calculator answers what a dried ounce soaks back to, without ever meeting the yield tool. This planner runs the yield backward on the low end of the range, so the worst batch still fills the jar: in the worked example, 1.5 lb of dried apple slices means 12.5 lb prepared and 15.7 lb bought, 13 trays and 3 runs of a 6-tray machine. It prices the power at the label wattage and your own rate ($2.88 for the three runs at 600 W and 17 cents a kWh), counts what a dried ounce costs you ($0.66 to $1.10 against a $0.75 shelf price), finds the produce price at which the store wins, and works a camp meal back from the plate to the market, with a one-ounce soak test that replaces our typical ratio with yours. Every figure is computed by the site's own calculators and every price is an example; weights to buy or pack and costs round up, break-even prices round down, and it promises no price and no saving. It covers fruit, vegetables, herbs and store-bought mushrooms, and arithmetic only: no meat, poultry or fish, nothing on curing, no storage times and no shelf life. Included: 24 printable pages, 7 steps, 4 working pages, reference tables, a quickstart, and a personalised sheet worked on the batch and soak you enter in the calculator.

Look inside

Two full pages from the book, exactly as printed. Click either to read it at full size before you decide.

What is in it

• Step 1: Buy for the Low Yield: a dried target back to prepared and purchased pounds, with your trim
• Step 2: The Whole-Run Rule: trays and whole runs of your machine, and what to do with a part-full last run
• Step 3: Price the Long Run: power at the label wattage, the long end of the hours and your own rate
• Step 4: The Dried-Ounce Rule: everything paid divided by the dried ounces, at both ends of the yield range
• Step 5: The Break-Even Rule: the produce price and the yield at which the store wins
• Step 6: The Plate-Back Rule: servings and a soak ratio back to the dried ounces to pack and the pounds to dry
• Step 7: Your Scale Beats Our Table: weigh in, weigh out, and a one-ounce soak test
• Four working pages: a batch planner, a run log, a cost and shelf sheet, a trip sheet with a soak-test card
• Reference tables: pounds to buy per dried pound by food, what a prepared pound soaks back to, kWh a run by wattage and hours
• A quickstart and a personalised sheet worked on your own batch and soak

The planner picks up where the free Batch Yield Estimator leaves off. The estimator turns a fresh weight into a dried range; the book runs it backward, from the dried food you want to the produce to buy, planned on the low end of the range so the worst batch still fills the jar. Then it fits the batch to whole runs of your machine, prices the power at your own rate, counts what a dried ounce really costs you, and finds the produce price at which the store wins. With the Rehydration Ratio Calculator it works a camp meal back from the plate to the market, and a one-ounce soak test replaces our typical ratio with yours. Every figure in it is an example, and it promises no price and no saving. It covers fruit, vegetables, herbs and store-bought mushrooms only, and arithmetic only: no meat, poultry or fish, nothing on curing, no storage times and no shelf life. For jerky, USDA FSIS recommends heating meat to 160°F and poultry to 165°F before the dehydrating process; see our jerky food-safety guide.