Dehydrating White Fish

Sophie suggests you try again.

Sophie Cat, Fish Drying Consultant – Product Testing Division

Lol…..

I'll bet the cats were going krazy while it dried from the smell ;-)

So where have I made the mistake. I placed in pre heated oven for 15 minutes wrapped in foil. It was cooked to really nicely (fish was cod fillet – skin removed).

I dehydrated it on high setting, and left it on for about 10 hours. It looked dry to me (Am I right in thinking it is not possible to over dehydrate food?). I rehydrated fish in water for about 40 mins and tasted. All the water had not ben soaked up into the fish.

I then left for another 2 hours but it seemed to me that the fish was not going to rehydrate any further.

Any tips?

Add salt, garlic and your choice of spices. You've now got nice fish jerkey. It's probably the best you'll get from dehydeating fish. In my experience even cooking dried fish, as in stews, you never get the same fish as you would with fresh or frozen. It's the nature of the beast.

Actually over dehydrate food :-( Some vegetables, fruit can get baked to the point that rehydration is never quite right. As well, pasta sauces with corn syrup added can get "burnt" while drying (corn syrup makes it hard to dry).

The only fish I have dried was salmon and tuna – I never could take the smell it produced while drying.

Get a smoker and then you'll have smoke salmon.
Patrick

When I grew up, my famly would catch & dehydrate several gallons of fish every year. Salmon usually turns out tough, while halibut comes out flakey. It depends a little on the direction you cut the strips, too. The old tribal way of eating it was to let it rehydrate for a full day & then cook it, but we'd just eat it like jerky or dip it in melted fish oil.

Salmon will turn out less tough if you soak it in something for a few hours first, then dehydrate it; I don't remember my family's old recipe, but I think it was based on soy sauce, honey, and black pepper. It doesn't *quite* get as dry as it normally would, so we'd freeze it afterwards. It tastes better than any jerky I've ever bought at the store.

You can also make "half-dry". Cut the fish so it's still thick, smoke it until the outer half gets dry but the inside is still moist, then store it in the freezer. Then you just thaw it when you want it, and cook it like a salmon fillet.