Freeze Dried Meats

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Freeze-dried meat is meat that has been frozen and then dehydrated in a process called lyophilization.  The food is first frozen to very cold temperatures (-20 F) and then a vacuum pump removes the water. 

Unlike dehydration which uses heat and shrinks the food, freeze-drying means the ice in the frozen food acts like a trellis to help the food keep its shape and texture as it’s preserved.  By the time all the ice (and thus water) is removed, the food’s texture is set and it doesn’t shrink or distort. 

All those spaces where water once was are preserved, meaning that when you add water it just absorbs back in where it was before…resulting in more or less the same taste and texture as before freeze-drying.

Rehydrating freeze-dried meat is pretty simple, and since it’s used by the military and astronauts, there have actually been a number of studies trying to determine the best way to rehydrate freeze-dried meats for the best quality.

In all the testing, they found that it honestly didn’t really matter….and it’s almost impossible to mess this up. 

Rehydrate with room temperature water or hot boiling water, the finished results are the same.  Cool water takes twice as long as hot water, and room temperature water is somewhere in the middle.  

The food absorbs the same amount of water either way, but the final temperature is just different.  With hot water, you have a hot meal at the end, obviously.

The quantity of water does matter, but less than you’d think.  Too little water and the food won’t completely rehydrate and will still be dried in the middle.  Too much water and the food will only absorb as much as it originally contained (but won’t over absorb water).

Once strained, the flavor and texture of rehydrated freeze-dried meat is the same provided it’d rehydrated with at least a 1:1 ratio of meat to water.  As in, 1 cup of water to 1 cup of freeze-dried meat.