Dried Apple - 36 hours later

The Mark 2 apple drier has completed it maiden voyage, or something like that. Anyway it's dried the apple we put in it in in 36 hours. I left it a bit longer than was absolutely necessary to make sure it was done. It came out like leather; flexible, but tough! To answer a question I had by email, we peel the apples first, then core them then slice them. Some slice better than others, some being very brittle, but it is still possible to skewer the bits even if the rings have broken up.

The best one were as follows: James Grieve, best tasting. Charles Ross, which did not discolour so much and tasted good. Tom Putt which has a nice sharp twang to it and a new variety from a seedling (I call it Red Spot) which is beautifully sweet. We did try other varieties, but they did not taste so good! None of them were recognised 'drying varieties' but it's a case of use what you've got. So it is not rocket science and I wish you all good drying. Oh yes, the dried apple weighed in at 7 ounces and just fitted into a 2 pound preserving jar, I guess we could have got a bit more in the drier if we'd tried.

Tomorrow is a cider making day so I'll try to remember to take some photos.

DIY Apple Drier

So apple time is here again and having had success with the mark one DIY apple drier I decided to see if I could make it a bit more robust. It was, after all, only a cardboard box, some knitting needles, kebab skewers and a dehumidifier. BUT it worked.
The mark two is a little more sophisticated, it's a cardboard box, a wooden frame, kebab skewers and a dehumidifier. As you can see a lot of development work has gone into this new design.
The idea is to use the dehumidifier to blow a stream of warm dry air over the apple rings, which are suspended on the wooden skewers. The box I used is a flower box which florists throw out by the dozen. The wooden frame makes it all a bit more robust than just sticking knitting needles through the cardboard, as I did in the Mk 1. Some skewers are stapled to the frame to support the ones on which the apple rings are threaded. A door is cut in the box to make it easy to load the apple.
A hole also needs to be cut for the dehumidifier to blow into. Of course there has to be a hole in the top allowing the air to leave, in this box the hand holes were big enough.
The apples need to be cut quite thinly, no more than 1/4" or 6mm. The mark one dried them in about a day, we'll see how the Mark 2 performs.