Product Description

This unit features Nesco/American Harvest's innovative Top Mounted Powerhead that dries food quickly and evenly with superior results. Detaches to make dehydrator dishwasher safe for easy clean up. Fan-Flow Technology means faster, more even drying with no tray rotation necessary. Perfect for the beginner.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #2494 in Kitchen & Housewares
• Brand: Nesco
• Model: FD-35
• Number of items: 1
• Dimensions: 10.00" h x 14.00" w x 14.10" l, 4.40 pounds

Features

• 425 watts of power dries foods, flowers quickly and evenly
• Use for fruits, vegetables, herbs, jerky, granola
• Dehydrate meals for camping, hiking, and other outdoor activities
• Patented system generates fast, even drying
• Includes five trays; expands to seven trays with accessory pack

Amazon.com Review
Drying apple slices in just five hours and beef jerky in seven, this 425-watt dehydrator is exceptionally fast for its price range. Its patented hot-air circulation system ensures not only speed but uniformity, so foods dry evenly. Each of the five trays is 13-1/2 inches in diameter and 1/2 inch deep (the plastic dehydrator stands 10 inches high), providing more than 12 square feet of tray space for drying lots of fruits, vegetables, herbs, and flowers at one time. Available separately is a two-tray accessory pack that expands the dehydrator to seven trays. Also available separately are accessories for drying fruit rolls, soups, and sauces and for making jerky from ground meat. Accompanying the dehydrator is a detailed instruction booklet with a drying-time chart for various foods and recipes for cooking with dried foods. --Fred Brack

Customer Reviews

A bit noisy, but easy to clean
I chose a top-element dehydrator as it's easier to clean (no drips onto the bottom element.) This dehydrator has sturdy, slightly flexible plastic trays. It's a bit noisy; when the heat goes on there is a whine I don't like, and the fan of course is noisy too. So making dehydrated foods (takes hours) needs a separate room, maybe the cellar.

The price is right on this dehydrator, but you need sheets for making jerky and fruit leathers. They aren't included (that's the minus-a-star) but you can pick them up at kitchen supply stores.

Very Happy
Got the FD35 for Christmas last year and am very happy with it. It consistantly dries things in about half of the time listed in "The Dehydrator Cookbook". Clean up is great; usually I just wipe the trays off, but when they need it everything except the heater/fan unit itself goes in the dishwasher.

My recommendations:
- Get the FD35, put it a few rooms away from the main living area as it is a little bit noisy.
- Get extra trays from Nesco's web site. The trays Amazon carries (at this time) are for the FD50 and _DO NOT_ work on the 35.
- Get the fruit leather trays and the clean screens
- Skip the cook books. Ive found online info and recipes much more useful than what is in the cookbooks.
- Experiment. Ive found that tiny marshmellows are great, but Ive never seen it in the cookbooks or online stuff.

I do have one problem that will not be an issue for most people.
The unit generates a lot of electomagnetic interference which causes a problem for my remote control extender. The remote control extender is a pyrimid-shaped device that allows me to use a remote in one room to control a device in another room. The dehydrator causes so much interference that it essentially "jams" the extender making it unusable. Ive moved the dehydrator several rooms away without any improvement. Now I dont get to watch satellite from the bedroom when the dehydrator is running....Oh Well.

Heat on the top, works just fine, but loud
There are debates if the heating element of a dehydrator should be on the top of the unit or underneath. (Heat rises, but fans blow down...hmm.)

Whatever the physics of it, the Nesco is reasonably priced, made of slightly flexible plastic that is not prone to breaking easily and makes fine dried fruits. We've tried dried apples, dried crackers of a tomato-onion-flax base and all came out wonderfully well. While there are more advanced dehydrators, this one is priced well and will make your jerky, fruit leather, preserved produce and other dried foods just fine. Recommend you get teflon sheets for making jerky--they are not included with the unit and you need donut-shaped ones. The sheets allow you to pour liquid batter onto the dehydrator and get leathers, jerkies and my favorite, dried flax crackers. I personally think they should come with the unit as it is a special shape and the sheets are an important feature, so I dinged the unit a star. Also the SAME star is dinged because the unit is loud. LOUD. LLLLLOOOOOOUUUUUUUUD. Did I say LOUD? Yes. Run it in the cellar, on the sunporch, in a distant bedroom. OR the garage. Because it is loud.