I have two older American Harvest dehydrators & have used them for 20 years. I tried the lemon juice treatment for the banana chips to keep them from turning brown, but prefer just slicing them into pineapple juice, draining them & drying them on the dehydrator trays. Personally, I use an 8 oz can of either pineapple rings, chunks or tidbits, drain the juice into a bowl, slice the bananas into it, drain them thru a colander into a second bowl & dry the pineapple on one of the trays along with the sliced bananas. Really good flavor in the banana slices & the pineapple pieces are good too. That one little can of pineapple has enough juice in it to do a surprising number of bananas. If you are not sure the fruit is done drying, toss it into a large ziploc baggie and let it sit overnight on the counter - this is called "equalizing" the moisture, and lets the too dry parts even out with the not quite dry enough parts. If the fruit does not feel dry in the am, put it back in the dehydrator again & it will finish rather quickly. If you skip the equalizing step, you will lose some of what you put up, because the outside edges of the fruit can feel very dry while the inside of the slice may not be dry yet.
I used my dehydrators the most for three things:
1)drying plum leather ( pit plums (ours were Blue Damson), throw in blender, puree, pour onto OILED Tupperware lids & set on the dehydrator shelves. When top feels dry, flip out of the lid directly onto the shelf & dry another few hours. Roll in plastic wrap to store: homemade fruit roll-ups. A friend of mine did the same with applesauce. It's portable & can go in lunches. Superb when you add a slice of the caramel meant for caramel apples, then roll it up & slice it!
2) drying pie cherries. Pit into a solution made from 2 cups sugar in 1 cup water. about 1/2 cup solution in the bottom of a quart jar is about right. This draws the liquid out of the cherries thru osmosis, & allows them to resorb the sugar syrup. Let the jars sit in the fridge for at least 2 days & up to 1 week. Drain the liquid into a bowl thru a colander. Place the cherries on the trays to dry - they will be like little red raisins & need to be almost hard to be done. Strain the juice thru a cheesecloth & bottle it. Makes GREAT punch mixed with lemon lime soda. The cherries are great inf ruit mix, cookies & oatmeal, but best dipped in white chocolate clusters for Christmas.
3) Dehydrate old bottled fruit. When it is time to fill the jars with apricots & you haven't quite used them all, drain the leftover jars & set the fruit on the trays. They take a little longer to dry this way, but the result is superb. I have multiple blue ribbons from the State Fair for "recycling" my bottled fruit into dried fruit. Apricots, peaches & pears are especially good this way.
The thing I like best about dehydrating is that the food takes up less space, so more fits on the same shelf!
