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this is the beginner's guide to how to
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freeze dry fruit for your home or your
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freeze drying business we're going to
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cover a lot of different topics the top
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five freeze-dried fruits that have sold
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the most for me as well as the tools
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that I've purchased that have made the
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preparation side very easy and smooth
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for the freeze drying process we're
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going to cover some of the equipment
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that I've bought as well as the freeze
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dryer settings that you're going to need
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for every single fruit that you freeze
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dry and stay tuned to the end of this
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video cuzz I'm going to share with you
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the packaging methods that you should
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use once the freeze-dried fruit is all
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done hey welcome back to the freeze
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dried business Channel if you're new
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here my name is David and I run a freeze
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dried business in Idaho I've been
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running it for the past four years and
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I've learned a lot of different things
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from the cottage food side running it
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out of my home to also having a
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commercial kitchen where I have
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wholesale and have learned a lot of
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different things in the food processing
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methods so hit the Subscribe Bell if you
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want to follow me and follow more
0:54
content related to freeze drying and
0:55
specifically freeze drying as a business
0:58
this is a huge Fun World of freeze
1:00
drying and I think it's only going to
1:02
grow even more so the more and more
1:04
subscribers and community that we build
1:06
here will benefit you all now today's
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video we're primarily going to cover
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what types of fruits I've seen
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successful in my freeze drying business
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and then some of the tools of best ways
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to kind of cut and prepare them and then
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the freeze dryer setting now the freeze
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Dryer's purpose is to extract the water
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from fruit but it's the purest form of
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keeping nutritional value in a food
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preservation method that's why the
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freeze drying industry is blowing up so
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much is because it's a great way to
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preserve your food and since the water
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is removed and then the fruit is dried
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at a high temperature now you're left
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with a way for you to crush the fruit
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flavor into a powder and that's why with
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the baking side of things now you can
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create a very flavorful type of cookie a
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flavorful cake or things like that that
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doesn't have that moist type of juice in
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it from the different fruits so that's
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why the application is very high with
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freeze-dried fruit now over the past 4
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years of running my freeze drying
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business as of this video I found that
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there's been six different types of
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fruits that have been the best sellers
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for me and I've Tred different fruits
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but it really doesn't have the same take
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as these now the first one is
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blueberries I've got a video on how to
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freeze-dried blueberries but we're going
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to do one tray of that today I've also
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found that strawberries have been a big
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seller I also would suggest you doing
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bananas and I also combine that to do a
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strawberry banana mix I've also had
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success with free drying apples as well
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as pineapple and raspberries now we're
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just going to do Apple strawberries and
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blueberries today just to keep it easy
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and simple now those are the six top
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freeze-dried fruits that I've been
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selling in my freeze drying business and
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I would suggest you try as well and then
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as you start finding what your customers
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like you can then pinpoint what you want
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to go for the most in terms of looking
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at having that as more of a consistent
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product to have now let's go over the
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tools that make these three fruits
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really easy to prepare now the
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blueberries I've got this roller Berry
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now this tool is something that I
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invested in it's it's quite expensive
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relative to other methods that you can
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use but this is the roller Berry it's a
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stainless steel rotating spinning type
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of poking tool and what it does is it's
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going to poke the skin of the
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blueberries and the reason you want to
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do that is because the skin of the
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blueberry keeps that water inside and so
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if you just put blueberries as is on the
3:28
tray it actually will explode and I'm
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showing you a picture right now of what
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those blueberries that are exploded look
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like so if you want them to look
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presentable and not exploding I would
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suggest you find a method to be able to
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poke these blueberries now I've done it
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individually with a with a little uh
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skewer little needle uh which took a
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long time you can also use a meat
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tenderizer but this has just been always
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sturdy for me and you don't have to buy
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a bunch of them they don't break down
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but if you want to go the cheaper route
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I've got a video link in the description
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below of the meat tenderizers as well as
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the link to Frozen W who makes this
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roller Berry and this is a really easy
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tool that I'll show you how to use for
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the strawberries we want to use this egg
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slicer that's right it's an egg slicer
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and you're going to put the strawberries
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in here and then you just snap it shut
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and then it cuts it into four to five
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different slices and the reason you want
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to use a slicer like this is because it
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actually can shorten the amount of time
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for the freeze drying process because
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the thinner the slice the shorter amount
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of time the freeze dryer is going to
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take to actually get to the last
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molecule of moisture in the strawberries
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and that's why I like slicing the
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strawberries as well now with the apples
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what I use is this Big hunken Tool and
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the reason I've used this is because
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it's actually a potato fry slicer and I
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like the Fry type of look because it I
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don't know it just looks more snacky if
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that's even a word and I like using it
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because it's also very fast and
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effective so that's what I like using I
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also have used the KitchenAid Apple
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slicer as well as just cut it up by hand
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but we're going to use this today and
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this you can find in the video
5:07
description it's a potato fry slicer now
5:09
you're also going to want a great sharp
5:11
knife something that doesn't dle too
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fast and I've used these Cutco types of
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knives and it's been a good investment
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because it never goes dull and I don't
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have to sharpen it that much now in my
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sink here to my left I've got a strainer
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so that way I can wash off all the fruit
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prior to preserving this now if you're
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in a commercial kitchen or you're
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preparing fruit for your customers you
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want to make sure that you have some
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gloves or you at least want to wash your
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hands in between handling different
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types of fruits because I'm in my
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kitchen right now in my home I'm just
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going to not wear gloves and it'll be a
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little bit messy but it's perfectly fine
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just because we're going to do this
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video These grates I bought off of
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Frozen r as well who makes the roller
5:50
Berry these allow for some air flow when
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the drying process is kicked on into the
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freeze dryer they make these for the
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stay fresh as well as for the the
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Harvest Right freeze dryer trays from
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different sizes now I have the Harvest
6:03
Right large freeze dryer and so these
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grates are for the large size trays and
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they fit perfectly inside the tray like
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this what I also like is these grates
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can easily be lifted out of the tray and
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then the fruit stays on top and then you
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can just dump it into your food safe
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bucket now if you don't own a freeze
6:19
dryer you can always go to my affiliate
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link Down Below in the video description
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I own Harvest right as well as stay
6:25
fresh freeze dryers both are great I
6:28
would suggest the Harvest straight
6:29
freeze dryer if you're starting a freeze
6:31
drying business they have the largest
6:32
freeze dryers right now for most
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affordable price for the highest
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capacity for example they have the XL
6:39
freeze dryer that can do upwards of 40
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lbs of food in one Cycle One cycle
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meaning you've got them all full full of
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fruit and so that's really nice compared
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to the large size which can do upwards
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of you know 16 lbs so it's over two
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times the amount of food that you can do
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just in one cycle and that really
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increases your bottom line in your
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freeze drying business because you want
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that freeze dryer running non-stop but
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also getting the most production out of
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it once you press start on that machine
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so that's what I would suggest and if
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you want to know more about freeze
7:08
Dryers go ahead and click the link below
7:11
in the video description and it'll tell
7:12
you more about different reviews that
7:14
I've made as well as you can check out
7:16
the website directly let's get started
7:17
with the blueberries first this
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container is 11 oz of blueberries I put
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two in my strainer wash them all and
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that's what we're going to put on the
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tray now you have to keep in mind when
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freeze drying is if you want to put as
7:31
much capacity on a freeze drying tray as
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you want that's perfectly fine but just
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know that it's going to take a lot
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longer for the freeze dryer and it's
7:39
processing its sensors to realize when
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it's all completely done so you could be
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looking at a very long dry time now
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today I've got a cutting board but
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typically what I have is one of the
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Harvest Right silicone mats that you put
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in your tray they make them for all
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different size freeze dryer trays now
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what that silicone mat allows you to do
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is just not have such of a hard surface
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when you're rolling using the roller
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Berry or you're using your meat
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tenderizer I just like having a a more
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soft cushion on there so we're going to
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take the blueberries out of the strainer
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and what I'm going to show you here is
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you just kind of line it up to the kind
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of the width of this roller Berry tool
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and I've just found that this just makes
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things a lot easier so you roll across
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and as you saw there it rolled and poked
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the blueberries now each blueberry has
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kind of like multiple different pokes so
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we put all those blueberries on the tray
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now the video footage I'm showing right
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now is not me right now it's actually of
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my other video on specifically how to
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freeze dry blueberries which you can
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take a look at in the video description
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or after this video I'll show it up in
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the thumbnails because this actually
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shows you a detailed look at how to use
8:49
this roller Berry tool how quickly and
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efficient you can do it and now that
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we're done here 22 oz roughly of
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blueberries is this is a great amount
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because we don't have doubling up of
9:01
volume on the tray so it's going to
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actually reduce our freeze drying time
9:05
now that we're done with this what I'm
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going to show you is these tray stackers
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and if you don't own tray stackers they
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literally fit right on the edges of
9:13
these trays a lot of people make these
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but I like buying from us made only so
9:18
I've got a link to the video description
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below of Freez dryings supplies.com as
9:23
well as links to Amazon with sofo
9:25
survival who makes these in America and
9:29
and they're 3D printed but they fit
9:31
perfectly and I've got a bunch of these
9:33
so that I can quickly prep and speaking
9:35
of preparation when you have a large
9:38
amount of fruit that you're getting
9:39
ready to prepare because maybe you got a
9:41
good deal on it you want to use that
9:44
time effectively and so using these tray
9:46
stackers you're going to do a ton of
9:48
blueberries or a ton of strawberries
9:50
when they're in season and that way you
9:51
can put these in your freezer and the
9:53
reason you're going to prefreeze is
9:55
because it reduces the amount of time
9:56
that you're having to prepare every
9:58
single time you want to put something
9:59
into the freeze dryer so if I've got 10
10:02
trays worth which is two cycles worth of
10:05
freeze drying now I can prepare 10 trays
10:08
worth of fruit I'm putting it into the
10:11
freezer then it's all Frozen I take out
10:14
five put them into the freeze dryer my
10:16
large freeze dryer and then when that's
10:18
done I've already got some already
10:20
prepped and in the freezer that I can
10:21
just put them in again so it makes it
10:24
just more of an easier process and
10:25
that's the thing to know as a beginner
10:28
is you want to make things easy for
10:29
yourself and especially when you get
10:31
into the seasonal side of purchasing
10:34
fruit you want to maximize the amount of
10:36
fruit that you're going to buy and
10:37
therefore prep it all at one time now
10:39
that we're done with the blueberries
10:40
let's move on to strawberries for the
10:41
strawberries the tools you need is
10:43
obviously a knife to cut off the stems
10:45
and then if you're going to slice them
10:47
you're going to use this egg slicer and
10:49
I've got a link in the video description
10:50
below to Amazon it's not more than 10 to
10:53
$2 for one of these now I have in my
10:56
strainer that I wash you want to make
10:58
sure you wash strawberry really well
10:59
because of all those pesticides that can
11:01
really soak in where the seeds are I
11:04
bought 2 lbs this is 2 lb of
11:06
strawberries one pound from the
11:08
container and that's about how much
11:10
strawberries I'm going to put on the
11:11
tray that's sliced again I've got a
11:13
grate now in this tray and as you can
11:16
see here's my blueberries underneath and
11:18
then I've got the tray stackers and it
11:20
sets right on top of here it's very easy
11:23
so we're going to cut the stems off of
11:25
strawberries and what I do is I put the
11:28
strawberries right there that have the
11:30
stems off and I put the stems in here
11:32
what we're going to do with the stems is
11:35
we're going to freeze dry them as well
11:37
on another tray and reason being is
11:40
because there's a lot of value in the
11:43
healthiness of the strawberry stems I
11:46
typically have always thrown away the
11:48
stems but I've been reading a lot more
11:51
about the healthiness of the stems and
11:54
I'm going to put up a little bit of
11:56
information about the healthiness of the
11:58
strawberries right now so that you can
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see why you should probably keep the
12:03
stems and freeze dry them the leaves um
12:06
there's a lot of value in that and when
12:09
you're freeze drying the whole point is
12:11
to preserve food and not have anything
12:13
go to waste so that's what we're going
12:15
to do is we're going to put the stems on
12:18
one tray as its own and have the sliced
12:21
strawberries right here now typically on
12:23
a large tray that I have for this
12:25
Harvest Right freeze dryer I really only
12:28
put about 2 lbs of strawberries on the
12:31
tray that are sliced because anything
12:33
else would be kind of an overload okay
12:35
so now that we got those sliced let's go
12:38
ahead and grab our egg slicer we're just
12:41
it right on the grooves where the slicer
12:45
are and then we're pressing down and
12:47
it's cutting sometimes it sticks like
12:50
this but it's cutting them into perfect
12:52
slices the thinner the slice the more
12:55
it's going to allow those freeze dryer
12:57
sensors to notice that there's less
12:59
water molecules in it for it to get it
13:02
completely dry cuz if you left it full
13:05
which I've seen people do that's
13:06
perfectly fine but think about how long
13:08
it's going to take for the sensors to
13:11
sense that the that there's no moisture
13:14
inside the very core of this in the
13:16
middle just going to take a lot longer
13:18
so I like to keep things simple and also
13:21
just makes a better snack uh when you're
13:23
selling it in your freeze dryer bag as
13:26
you can see here this is 2 lb of St
13:29
strawberries all cut up all right so as
13:31
you can see we're going to put more tray
13:32
stackers for to a tray and now we can
13:38
top for our apples that we'll do next
13:41
all right moving on to Apples now again
13:43
you can choose to slice up apples any
13:45
way you want to what I've chosen to use
13:47
is a potato slicer this is a really
13:50
sturdy potato slicer it has suction cups
13:53
that can attach to your counter no
13:54
matter where you are and then you're
13:56
simply going to put the Apple into the
14:00
little slider area right here and when
14:02
this slides through you can put the tray
14:05
right below it and when you press
14:07
forward it slices it perfectly into
14:10
these apple slices and now what you're
14:12
seeing me do here is I'm just removing
14:14
the kind of the core Pieces Just because
14:17
at least for me I don't really like the
14:19
core pieces when I eat an apple but I'm
14:21
going to take those out so that the the
14:23
seeds and the core part doesn't get
14:25
freeze-dried because again I'm selling
14:28
this to customers I'm not doing it for
14:30
my own use customers are going to be
14:33
different than what you're going to use
14:34
freeze-dried fruit for right so you want
14:37
something that's going to be presentable
14:38
that looks nice and it's not just
14:41
something that you know came out of your
14:42
own home right you want something to
14:44
look presentable all right so now we're
14:46
done with slicing up the apples that was
14:47
really quick now this is five Gayla
14:50
apples on one tray this is a perfect
14:52
amount now so that these don't Brown up
14:55
too much I immediately put them in the
14:56
freezer if you want you could maybe
14:58
sprinkle spr Le over some lemon juice or
15:01
something like that that's what I've
15:02
seen do it but I just don't like the The
15:04
Taste or kind of the smell of it so what
15:07
I do is I just quickly actually put
15:09
these in the freezer three different
15:10
fruits all stacked together and this is
15:13
why I use the tray stackers and then
15:15
we're going to put two more trays worth
15:17
of fruit on top of here and that is how
15:19
you prepare apples strawberries and
15:21
blueberries now let's get to the
15:23
packaging and the freeze dryer settings
15:25
if you're liking the content you're
15:26
liking freeze drying fruit hit the like
15:28
button right now this is really going to
15:30
help the video come up more in YouTube
15:32
and on Google for future people who are
15:34
looking to freeze dry fruit I'd really
15:36
appreciate it and once again hit the
15:37
Subscribe Bell if you're not a
15:38
subscriber already I'd love for you to
15:40
join the freeze drying business
15:41
Community now once you're done with
15:43
prefreezing your fruit or if you just
15:45
want to pop it in right away you're
15:47
going to make sure that the freeze dryer
15:50
125° fah for freeze drying the fruit now
15:54
what you do want to customize is the
15:55
final dry time and I would set that at a
15:57
minimum of 6 hour that just gives you
15:59
more peace of mind that it's drying at a
16:01
high temperature and getting all that
16:03
water out now typically people ask
16:05
what's the typical time frame for how
16:06
long it's going to take for freeze-dried
16:08
fruit that's all going to vary on how
16:11
much fruit and product you're putting on
16:13
the tray but generally if I'm going to
16:15
do all five trays of my large Harvest
16:18
Right freeze dryer with 2 lbs of
16:20
strawberries to start with that's 10 lb
16:23
total of freeze-dried strawberries and
16:26
that 10 lb is typically going to take
16:28
about 36 6 to 40 hours to freeze dry
16:30
completely now let's talk about the
16:32
packaging size so once you have the
16:33
freeze-dried fruit done you're going to
16:35
take it out and put it in some food
16:37
grade type buckets and I've got some
16:39
information below about those buckets
16:41
and I also did a short about what type
16:43
of buckets I use now again go to the
16:45
video description below and you'll check
16:46
out the eight commonly almost asked
16:48
questions about packaging and that's
16:50
where I share what type of buckets I use
16:52
now the three things that are going to
16:53
impact your freeze-dried fruit from
16:54
going bad or soft is sunlight moisture
16:57
and oxygen and so it should be dry so
17:00
you don't have to worry about the
17:01
moisture unless you're in a high
17:03
humidity area and that's when you'd want
17:05
to be careful about where you're storing
17:06
the free- dried fruit but let's just
17:08
talk about the other two factors
17:10
sunlight and oxygen so with sunlight if
17:13
you're using bags like I have with my
17:15
freeze drying business this has a window
17:18
on it so if it's going to be exposed to
17:20
any type of sunlight that is going to
17:22
impact the color of the freeze-dried
17:25
fruit over time as well as it's going to
17:26
impact the freshness of it as well
17:28
typically try to get these sold within
17:31
about 3 to 4 months using these craft
17:34
bags and I've got a link in the video
17:36
description where I get these bags off
17:38
of Amazon but if you're going to use
17:39
something else that has Windows just
17:41
remember the sunlight is going to impact
17:43
that now the third factor is the oxygen
17:45
side that's when you're going to want to
17:46
use oxygen absorbers to put into the bag
17:50
now there's a lot of different debate
17:52
and information about what type of size
17:55
oxygen absorbers you should have but
17:57
generally you want to go with probably a
17:59
300cc oxygen absorber and one video I
18:02
love that talks about this is on the
18:04
live life simple YouTube he's got a
18:07
great video that I'm going to link in
18:08
the video description that talks
18:10
specifically about oxygen absorbers and
18:11
he goes through all the science as well
18:13
as what type of sizes to use and all
18:15
that type of thing so I'm not going to
18:16
go through that but you would want to
18:18
use an auction absorber for your
18:20
freeze-dried fruit no matter whether you
18:22
have a myar bag that doesn't have a
18:23
window or one that does okay now if you
18:26
want to know more about packaging and
18:28
get these questions answered that you
18:29
have lingering go to the next video that
18:31
I'm going to share about the eight
18:32
commonly most asked questions about
18:34
packaging or freeze-dried product I'll
