Meal in a Bag | Freeze Drying a Complete Meal
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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 29 ก.ย. 2024
- MRE style meals like those "meal in a bag" from Mountain House can run on average about $10 each. With a freeze dryer, you can make you own at home for a faction of the cost. So today, that's what we're going to do - after we whip up a huge batch of Jambalaya. This was super easy to do, the hardest part is trying to figure out how much water to add to reconstitute. For our meals, we added about 2 cups of dried food to the bags. We started with 1.5 Cups of water, but that seemed like a bit too much. So for this recipe, about 1.25 Cups of water should be about perfect!
We were really impressed with the mylar bags. They're super thick, and really hold the heat in. There's a link to them below if you're interested.
🛒 Mylar Meal Pouch Bags: amzn.to/3M3u5gH
🍃 HARVEST Right Freeze Dryers: affiliates.har...
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This is so timely. I just took out breakfast scramble from my freeze dryer last night and packed it in individual meals. Working on teriyaki chicken and rice today, biscuits and sausage gravy, chicken and dumplings but I'm always looking for inspiration. I've been watching the channel Retired at 40. He goes through the entire process to include how to figure out the water ratio for rehydration.
You have to know how much the tray weighs. Then weigh it with the frozen food on it. After it’s done, subtract and get the amount of water it lost- divided by the amount of meals you got, then you know how much water to add 😊 It’s not perfect but less is more! You can always add but you cannot take away. You’ll be good. 😳
After two minutes open it and fluff, close back up. Lay it on its side while rehydrating.
Chili and spaghetti works GREAT! So do mashed potatoes.
I’ve never made anything intentionally for the freeze dryer but I’ve recently been freeze drying left overs and it’s worked amazing! Always looking for new items to add so thanks for the video
Oh my ❤ today is the first day I looked up videos for freeze drying and yours popped up first. I was like that looks a lot like Rachel and then when I looked at the description in the video I was like holy cow that is Rachel! How exciting is this adding you to my subscribers list and can't wait to watch all your videos. Currently making applesauce for my granddaughter the dehydrator has sweet and spicy bacon and I'm getting ready to cook up some hamburger meat to can that. Looking so much forward to learning from you too!
You guys are wonderful. I learned to make yogurt, from watching you. I'm good at it now. Got the xl freeze dryer. I have freezes dried cows milk, whey, Cottage cheese, cheese, my favorite vegetables, chicken, beef, pork, dog food, horse radish, French fries, fried Yams, hamburgers. Gonna freeze dry my favorite old settler beans, with bacon and hamburger. Gonna mail my grandson some. Lol They love my beans. I've freeze dried fresh Peaches, apples. Eggs galore. The cows milk is delicious. Tastes fresh, when restored. I make a ton of cheese. When I'm overloaded with milk, I put it in the freeze dryer. The xl trays can take a half a gallon of liquid. Eggs, 36 blended. I don't buy Chewys anymore. I'm freeze drying chicken and meats, for my dog. Saving me a load. I love going to the store and not having to buy any dairy. I've mastered what I would buy. Loving the TH-cam education, I'm getting. God bless you both. Love your videos. 🌟🌟🌟🌟🌟
doesn't the sausage have too much grease and go rancid?
You have a beautiful wife my guy.👍🏾
I freeze dry chili, sausage gravy, split pea soup, chicken fried rice, ham and bean soup, and refried beans! Yum and a game changer on busy nights!
Do you ever have issues with pasta or rice being too mushy? Trying to decide if I should leave the pasta out and add later or cook it and freeze dry all together
We made numerous freeze dried meals for trip to Florida after last falls hurricanes. It worked well, and we ate food that was healthy and home cooked. My hubby's favorite was homemade mac and cheese.
Wow! More of these videos please!!! My husband is an airline pilot and we were just discussing the possibility of doing this for his on the road meals so he can eat more real food and less restaurant meals. So your timing is absolute perfection.
Give us an update on how it was the next day after sitting on the fridge did the meat fully hydrate and did the soupy-ness get any better?
Todd has it the next day for lunch, and everything was fully hydrated and tastey.
That's such a good idea! Would definitely love to see more videos on the freeze drying meals.
I second this. More freeze-dried meals.
Yes! I second this. Please more of this.
We have made and eaten many dishes. Chili with Meat, Chicken and Rice, Beef Stroganoff, Baked Ziti with Meat Sauce, Chicken Ala King with veggies, Breakfast Egg Scramble with onions, peppers, cheese and sausage, Split Pea and Ham soup and many more.....we bring them on camping trips and heat boiling water seal the pouch and wait until it's rehydrated. We have freeze dried a lot of fruits we bring for snacks. It has simplified camping
I've done chili Mac, spaghetti, chili, soups, goulash. You'll love doing the meals once you get used to it. 😁
Glad you did this video! My freeze dryer is going to save in lunch money! It will cost a few bucks up front but, the plan is to use thermos' to pack the lunches in, and use those for work. I freeze leftovers, but, at 5AM it's hard to think about "what's for lunch", from the freezer! I ordered the food dividers from Freeze Drying Supplies, so that I can portion out the servings and pop them into a thermos for lunches.
We do this all the time. My husband likes to go motorcycle camping so these are super light and can allow him to have good meals while out riding. We’ve done spaghetti, chili with beans, goulash, fried rice, etc. Just need to be careful when using any kind of meat. Like we will cook the beef and rinse it in hot water and then add it to the sauce and noodles.
You can weigh the trays but we just kind of add some water, wait and then add more if needed.
It’s so much fun!
Thank you for sharing. I’ve got my freeze dryer on layaway & can’t wait to get it here & begin freeze drying food for our long term pantry
I love this episode! I have a harvest right too and I freeze fried some chili and Moroccan chicken and some they turned out great but I’d love more ideas!
My favorite meal to freeze dry is pasta bake. Mashed potatoes are excellent. You almost can't tell them from fresh. I too have been concentrating on ingredients. Then realized I needed to make some meals for power outages etc. Oatmeal is another good choice for the freeze drier.
Growing up in a large family and use to help cook for 10 Like Todd it was hard to scale down to 2 people when I got married. That jambalya looks so good.
We do many of these in Pint jars (single person) or Quart jars (for hubby and I). I even made little cozies for the jars so we can pour the hot water in and let them set until we need them a few hours later on our road trips, doctors appointments, on our way to somewhere, our homemade goodness! Love this!!!!!
Question. In the jars, do you use the oxygen absorbers? Thank you.
And great idea about the jar cozies.
Great idea!! Even though I couldn't afford one, fun idea to watch!
I don't have meal in a jar, that is ready to heat and eat. I am researching that now, love your channel guys. Pat
The production of the videos keeps getting better ! Great job on the content and the video.
How exciting! I suggest unstuffed pepper casserole to try
I'd love to see more dehydrator content. Most of us will never be able to afford a freeze drier. Kudos to those who can but looking for dehydrator content. Love your channel. Just skip these that showcase things that I will not be able to do. ❤
The Purposful Pantry is a great channel for dehydrating. That's how she does most of her food preservation. 😊
Harvest Right has 3 sizes. Different prices. Always think about preservation and cost saving. Some things in life just pay for themselves. This is just one example. I wish you the best.
Love watching Todd and his magic knife!
I add a can of Rotel to the Zatarains jambalaya. I try to keep one of the rice mixes and Rotel and a sausage in my freezer so there is always a meal that s quick and easy
So awesome that you have posted this video! This entire past week I have been thinking about doing some FD meals. I too, just have been doing single ingredient freeze-drying. Thank you for motivating me to ACTUALLY DO IT!!
I've found that with freeze dried rice meals, in particular, the rice seems to get over, hydrated. Maybe slightly undercooked rice would help this, but I haven't had a chance to test my idea. I also want to try "pearling" or toasting the rice before cooking it, which helps limit the amount of water it will absorb while cooking.
I also found that sausage, due to its high fat content, tends to go rancid faster than is ideal. Be aware of where you store it, make sure to keep it as cool as possible. It will take on a cardboard-y taste.
They freeze drying some chili!
Also, get some garlic chopped and freeze dried and ditch the Jarlic! You'll never go back
When I seen what your making I jumped for joy!!! I had recently started cleaning out the fridge freezer and came across my leftover Zatarains beans and rice.
Love the stuff!!!
It’s nice being able to make your own meals. If you want to buy them like my dad did one year for camping, they would cost a fortune for sure.
Where did you find the gusseted meal pouches? We have been doing mostly meals in our freeze dryer. We will be traveling in our fifth wheel for 2 years and this will be a great way to stock it up, without a lot of weight.
I found the pouches through your Amazon link.
How do you store the bags? Can’t beat how beautiful canned goods look when stored.
Great video! Inspired a lot of ideas for us! Thank you! Blessings on your day Kiddos!🥰🌻🐛💕
Love the video! My only comment is y'all should kindly consider using a wood cutting board instead of the plastic - you're introducing a ton of microplastics from it into your food and those don't ever leave the body. It's cheaper... but at a cost.
I would rather have microplastics than bacteria from wood.
I still cook for a full house. I also find that after being the only cook for 48 years I don’t mind having leftovers. I don’t have to cook every single day. I often freeze individual servings of leftovers. This would be a much better option in case electricity goes out. Luckily we don’t have that very often.
The sausage may li:it the number of years you can keep the meal freeze dried.
i am doing that now with speghetti. I have pressured canned hamburger, tomato sauce, freeze dried mushroom, onions. Tomorrow I will cook speghetti noodles and add to my crock cookeed meat sauce and load it onto
freeze dried pans. Did you pre-freeze your meal prior to freeze drying? So much better to have all in one meals.
Thanks for sharing you experiment.
Very cool! It makes me want to get a freeze dryer! Thanks.
I love to fd meals. Spaghetti, chili, butternut squash soup, and beef stroganoff are my favorites.
So… you cooked a freeze dried meal to try and freeze dry it? 😂
we cooked a normal meal, and freeze dried the leftovers. the rice was dry, but I suppose the veggies and seasoning in the box may have been freeze dried. not sure 😃
I stopped buying the Zatarain's Jambalaya because they changed the flavor. 😢. I'll buy it again and add the Tony's with peppers and onions. Thanks for sharing. Looked good.
As soon as I started watching this the second you said you were doing meals. I knew what meal would be first! Todds go to meal.
I’ve been freeze drying for the last three or four years. And I cooked a huge supply of gumbo, jambalaya and rice and beans. I would suggest taking out some of your jambalaya with the next few months and trying it. From my experience, the sausage and the fat from the sausage, and the jambalaya has produced a slightly stale taste. This also has happened in the beans. But not the gumbo, I’m pretty sure that I’ve come up with a solution to fix that. The first is to remove the sausage from his casing and smash it up into a smaller pieces. The second thing that I do is that I cook the jambalaya , but I do not add the rice until the last step I allow the liquid to sit overnight in the refrigerator to cool off so that the fat will come to the top and harden and then I skim the excess fat. Then I reheat the liquid and add the rice and let it cook for an hour or two on low heat . I’ve also gotten into making my own sausage. This is a huge benefit because it allows me to control the fat content that goes within my sausage there’s also a huge savings compared to the price of store-bought . It’s around 75% savings , I can make 20 pounds of sausage for about 25 to 30 dollars vs 140to 160 that I would spend at tue store minus the 1 time investment of the equipment. Are use a KitchenAid make sure with a meat grinder attachment to ground the meat and a pop LEM sausage stuffer that I purchased new on offer up for half the price for 80. Third it’s very easy to make it is time consuming but it’s well worth it because I can make the sausage according to what I desire as far as taste it’s very rewarding. Last, but not least, I vacuum seal my mylar bags, and I add oxygen absorbers to get rid of all the excess oxygen. Fat needs oxygen in order to become rancid. These are the steps that I use now to make the beans and rice, and the jambalaya That I freeze dryer hope this helps!!!
Love it! Thank you. My husband and I will be trying this next.
Hi ,just come across ur Chanel,
Watched for first time ,
So looking forward to the next ,best of luck with ur meal ,and drying ,hope u manage sort water level ,
All the best from UK
Hello, that was SO interesting! I was wondering if you could do something like that. I was wondering, because the bags are resealable, can you wash them and then reuse them? Maybe not for anything hot, or maybe yes, but for something else? Thanks, i loved this video. Have a wonderful day!
This is so great! Love this video! Thanks
I love watching your videos. As a person who can't afford a freeze dryer I usually don't watch my favorite channels freeze dryer videos.
Please watch the guy one School Reports seams to have is together with rehydrating. And I do like his was of checking for dryness. Hope this as much help for you two as you have been for me.
I was going to say 2 to 1 when rehydrating!!! Thank you for sharing this with us!!! God Bless!!!
Those meals that we can't make a smaller batch, kind of like when I make soup, somehow it always turns into a full pot, its hard to cook small when your used to making a big amount.
I use my canning jar funnel to fill bags. Also, I cut a vacuum seal bag roll the length of my FD tray and seal it from a couple of inches down the side at an angle to the cut end making a smaller opening. I use a chip bag clip to close the angled bottom and slide the tray inform the top, and dump the food into the bag to fill my mylar bags...think frosting piping bag.
A fruit crisp like cherry or rhubarb and apple would make a yummy camping breakfast or dessert
When I saw Tony’s I knew it would be good! I’m from Louisiana
Please get rid of those plastic cutting boards! It is one of the worst offenders of adding microplastics into your foods. Beautiful video! Thank you
I have a deep freezer full of meats like pork butt, while chicken, chicken thighs, legs and boneless breasts, pork chops and large slabs of stew beef . Is it ok to thaw them to cut down to chunks for freeze drying?
Once in the bags and sealed, how long will these meals last? Or fruit, or anything really? 5 years? 10 years? Few months?
If you can find it, the Tony’s brand jambalaya mix is much better.
I am getting ready to purchase a freeze dryer. What size is in your video? Any recommendations on size? I'm thinking of traveling around the US in my motorhome.
Looking into this because feel like buying it pre freeze dried is way overpriced for what you get... rather invest more and produce way more than what i could buy from mh or any survival food supply
Did you find that the sausage reconstituted okay? I find that it never really fully regains the consistency of the original sausage, perhaps due to the fat content? Curious what you found.
Ugh TH-cam unsubscribed me from all the channels I watch. I'm going to have to write me a list in case they do it again. Haven't seen y'all in about a month so have videos to catch up on!
yeah i knew it was too much water added. that cup and half was a little too much. I think a half a cup would've been sufficient enough
I like Todd's knife skills
I wish the price of freeze dyers wasn’t so much. I’d love to have one for food storage but geez…..
I noticed that you used some previously freeze dried peas in recipe. Is there any issues with refreeze drying something?
What a great way to save leftovers!!!
If you like Cajun seasoning you have to try the two step. I promise you it is better than what you us3d in this video.
I was thinking that maybe you could cut the sausage up smaller.
Great idea! Beef stew would be a good one to do! My guess would be to try 2/1. 2 dry/1 wet.
Most mountain house have you wait 10 minutes. That might have softened the sausage.
I agree Echridge smoked sausage is the best!! That looked delicious!
That is really cool I’m gonna have to get one and try out thanks for showing how it’s done
I was wondering how it would taste and the texture of the meat. Thank for doing this.
Have yall done a follow up episode to this freeze dried meal effort?
use gloves when handling the freeze dry when storing to avoid oils from hands getting on food
This is such a nice idea to preserve food but if the electricity goes out you can't use it. Just saying!
Don’t you have trouble with the fat going rancid?
Hello, I know that you went over the cost of canning and growing your own vegetables and meat, but what is the cost of storing all that meat in the freezers. The electric here in California is so expensive, that i am trying to come up with a better way to perserve and keep my product. I would love to know if that is an issue.
Canning that meat to get it out of the freezer is great! No electricity to store and it's already cooked for quick meals!😊
Are you a homestead if all of the food in your meal is from a supermarket? Hmm.
Just what I have been looking for!!!
I just guess. Way to time consuming to weigh out portions.
Put 1 cup you can always add more if needed. But can’t get it out
Helpful - thank you!
I am new to this channel. What size dryer do you hav e.
We make hash and use them to dry faster. Then we press that in heated presses and make rosin.
Totally in! Great music.
You should have weighed your trays.
Thanks! This was very interesting.
What kind of bag sealer do you use?
I dehydrate hamburger and last week I had guest show up suddenly and I took some of the dehydrated hamburger put hot broth in it and rehydrated it in 20 min then added to my sloppy Joe meal….was a saver for me.
Same with dehydrated chicken I ground into a powder….made into a gravy and poured over noodles added rehydrated veggies and whalla we had a casserole.
I keep my dehydrated meats in vac sealed bags or jars in the freezer…..for my own peace of mind. I’d like a freeze drier but all that money needs to pay bills before SHTF.
Have you freeze dried meats? What about jerky?
Pork chops, Ham , tuna
How about Moisture Absorbers ???
Awesome..That looked really good. Like you, I just wing it on water when re-hydrating.
Thank You for keeping a great beard brother. Equipping the world for better living. You both are doing a great job for humanity's sake. Thank you.❤
That's neat, great idea.
Couldn't you go by what a boughten package has. The mountain one I looked at says 4.2oz serves 2 and add 1 1/3 cups of water? Just an idea... Love the channel!
Retired at 40 TH-cam channel has gobs of tips & tricks ! I highly recommend looking there for questions
You guys are so lucky to have a freeze dryer, I do not need one my Children are grown now., I wouldn’t know how to use it any 4-8-2023❤