Harvest Right Freeze Dryer - The Best Way to Preserve Food - Food Dehydrator, Small Size, White Color

I agree with the 5 star reviews. A freeze dryer is useful to have. However, you need to understand that a freeze dryer isn't a turnkey device. You have to maintain the vacuum pump (which means filtering the oil after every batch and then benching the vacuum pump, disassemble and clean it after 20 batches). That's not hard, but it's not turnkey either.Also, it generates a lot of heat, even the small freeze dryer. I have a standard 2 car garage and it keeps it toasty in the winter. Dealing with the vacuum pump is messy. You probably don't want to do that over carpet. A freeze dryer is loud. I understand that some folks keep theirs in their house, I just can't imagine that working out well. Ours is in the garage. In the summer, I have a fan that runs continually to keep the garage cool. In the winter, I enjoy the toasty garage when working on projects.I have two freeze dryers. A small I bought new in August and an older unit I bought on Craigslist. Between the two, I end up calling Harvest Right tech support at least once a month. My new freeze dryer had the vacuum pump bind up. I was able to bench it and fix it, but the vacuum pump is the Achilles heel of the HR freeze dryer. They tend to fail.The bottom line is there is a learning curve. You need to join a facebook HR group to get past the first several loads. This is because the videos don't really go through the step-by-step of using a freeze dryer and you will assume that it works differently than it actually does. This results in probably a month or so of learning about how to prep food for the freeze dryer and how to setup of the freeze dryer for different types of food. It turns out high sugar fruits (like pineapple or apples) are the hardest to get right. Which was also the first thing we tried and were understandably disappointed with the results because of our ignorance about using the appliance.Having said all of that, we really like our freeze dryers. I've lost 20+ lbs because of snacking on freeze dried fruit rather than chips or other high calorie snacks. My wife who has several food allergies has been using it to make travel food so she can eat something when traveling. That has eased her travel anxiety because of food issues. The bottom line is know what you are getting into before you buy one. Start by following a Facebook group to get an idea of what you are in for.

The freeze drying unit was shipped promptly and very adequately protected for shipment. Easy to unpack; required two people to place on countertop- I installed it on a 24x24x1" solid wood base with the vacuum pump to the side. Good clear instructions (READ THEM ALL! ) on assembly to vacuum pump and vacuum testing. So far we have run probably 15 batches of food through it in two months - only one batch took a lot of extra time- too thick (whole chicken breasts; I should have split them).It is VERY important to change the vacuum pump oil EACH time; moisture builds up in the pump oil and is NOT good for vacuum pumps. This freeze- dry/vacuum system easily gets to 200mT. The oil filter supplied with the unit could use some upgrading . I had to rebuild it with heavier food-grade plastic components- not a big issue or problem. Keep everything clean, especially the door seal; without a good vacuum seal it doesn't work. This is a well designed unit, BUT I highly recommend educating anyone using it to familiarize themselves with the entire theory and process of freeze-drying and the use and maintenance of vacuum pumps. My background in Physics and very high vacuum work (0.001mT) helped. Positives: Affordable, efficient, gets the job done, seems durable so far. Negatives: needs a slight upgrade to the vacuum oil filter (fell apart?)

Like many other people, we bought our freeze dryer to preserve food for long-term food storage. We save our leftovers, food from our garden, and buy food in bulk to freeze dry and have as part of an emergency food storage. As we've been using the machine, however, we've found that a lot of what we freeze dry we use daily for snacking.Our kids love freeze dried fruit and yogurt. We can hardly keep bananas, peaches, or yogurt around for long. We've always been careful with what our kids eat, but they have happily traded chips and candy for fruit and yogurt. It's been great for our family.I'm also an avid backpacker and camper. Using the freeze dryer to prepare meals for the backcountry has been a real big boost to my time outdoors. I'm able to have much better meals while backpacking than ever.The machine is easy to use, and setup was a breeze. Once setting it up in our storage room, it was only a few short moments before our first batch of food was in and drying. It's been over a year, and we've used the machine consistently ever since we got it.If you're into healthy living, backpacking, emergency prep, or just want better snack foods, a freeze dryer is a must.

I bought Medium Harvest Right Freeze Dryer approximately one year and half ago. I love my machine and ran it almost 20 hrs a day.The machine is great but the customer service deserves 12 Stars!!! I have never had a company that was not just on top of everything but they care about each customer. I read articles and reviews before I bought my machine and read about good customer service and bad customer service but I can truthfully say the customer service and tech guys are over 21 stars itself.This company has their business and customer relationship so strong I cannot compare to any other company I dealt with. Also, there's no pressure sales involved with this guys.My 150 Star hat to Harvest Right!!!The machine is great for prepping or saving money buying food and storing for short or long term to save you money on food.I back this company because I never knew how they would be after buying but can 100% back them up to anyone who gives a negative review.

I have not not stopped using my Harvest Right Freeze Dryer since the day it arrived. I made a lot of snacks for Christmas gifts and I have moved on to meals and having great success. I thought about this purchase for years before I pulled the trigger and I’m so glad I finally got one!