CuisinPro 600W dehydrator

Hi all

Well the conversations on dehydrating food have piqued my interest. I have bought the Mary Bell book which hasn't put me off so I now need to buy. Fleabay have the above CuisinPro model. I would love to buy an Excalibur, but I don't have the experience yet to justify that cost to the boss. I am worried that if I buy one of the cheaper products it may not give me a fair experience of the real benefits plus I think I have lots to dehydrate and the space limitations might be a problem. Price-wise the CuisinPro sits middle-ish and appears to have some of the features of the more expensive devices.

So anyone got a CuisinPro? What do your reckon? What other might you advise?

I would be quite happy to buy a cheap one and replace it next year if it proves its worth.

Thank you for your consideration.

BP

I bought a Wolf dehydrator from Amazon, cost me £35 and works like a charm. It has plenty of capacity because the trays are pretty big and you've got five of them. I like that they're transparent too, so I can have a quick visual check on how things are going without having to open it up. It has temp control but not a timer. But if you particularly wanted a timer, there's nothing to stop you spending a couple of quid on one of those timer gadgets you plug into the socket.

I have both a Nesco and an Excalibur and both have their advantages. The 9 tray HD Excalibur can do a lot fairly quickly, but isn't so great with tomatoes for some reason. But, you can remove all the trays, put it at the lowest setting (95F) and proof bread or make yogurt. Can't do the proofing or yogurt in the Nesco as the round trays must sit on one another.

The Nesco is good for smaller batches and is better with tomatoes but the darned stuff gets caught in the slat trays, whereas the Excalibur has nice grid sheets that little can get tangled into. Got my Nesco almost new at a yard sale for $8, while the Excalibur was new and cost close to $300.

I'm glad I have both as each has its advantages and I plan to do a great deal of dehydrating. I too had nowhere to store mine so we bought a small former stereo cabinet from a used furniture place and it's a perfect size. The Excalibur sits right on top, there are 2 doors with 2 shelves inside, and the unit is on wheels if it needs to be moved. It was a steal at $10.

got mine off ebay but needs a transformer lots of other similar ones in the uk though.

That's why I started with the yard sale find for $8. Gave me a taste of how it all worked, timing, etc. When I felt I could keep it up, then I went to the Excalibur.