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LEM 10 Big Bite Dehydrator

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Best For: Dehydrating large quantities on a regular basis and for large batches of jerky. Stainless steel will last a lot longer than plastic, so if you plan to make dehydrated snacks every week or two, invest in the LEM 10 Big Bite all metal dehydrator. 

Quick Specs: 770W | 10 Chrome Plated 16 ¼" x 14 1/2" Trays | 1-24 hour timer | 90 -155° F Temperature Range | Rear-Fan System

Pros:

• Large Capacity - The LEM Digital 10 has lots of surface area with its 10 - 16.25" x 14.5" trays, giving you about 16 sq ft of drying area
• Customizable Presets - Make the same recipe all the time? Make a 1-button preset - set the time and temperature with the push of one button. Program up to 3 custom presets
• Chrome Plated Trays - Small ¼" square holes make it easy to lay even the smallest banana chips without falling through the racks and lasts much longer than plastic counterparts
• Dishwasher Safe - Run the trays through the dishwasher when you're finished dehydrating for easy cleanup
• Quiet - The LEM Big Bite is a whisper quiet dehydrator and will become ambient background noise while in use

Cons:

• Small grates can be harder to clean with stickier foods like jerky. It's more difficult to remove food from metal trays compared to plastic trays; LEM sells parchment paper specially cut for their metal trays to make cleanup easier
• Takes longer to dehydrate compared to smaller units. Expect to run the machine an hour or two longer to account for the larger space it has to keep warm.
• There are some sharp edges on the bottom of this dehydrator, take care when moving and storing machine so the sharp edges don't dig into your hands and cause harm

Our in-depth taste testing, we tasted pineapple from 6 hours, 12 hours, and 15 hours in the dehydrator to test for taste, texture, and moisture content and against other models of dehydrators.

 

We tested a little bit of everything you might be making in a dehydrator. Pineapples - for a high moisture fruit, Bananas - for a medium moisture fruit, Mushrooms - for a low moisture vegetable, sliced beef jerky and stick style jerky- for a raw meat. In each of these foods, we tested for moisture content, texture, and taste.

We took samples of each of these foods at different time intervals to monitor the moisture content and texture. After doing this, we were able to determine the fastest dehydrators and which ones dried the food most evenly. You can see all of the models we tested in our Top Dehydrator Review.

A good dehydrator should be able to evenly dry your food at a proper and consistent temperature range. This will produce the optimal tasting and shelf-stable dehydrated food. 

Design & Construction

The huge chrome plated trays give the LEM 10 a LARGE amount of space to dehydrate out of all our top dehydrators. The huge trays give you 16 sq ft of space to utilize. The all-metal design is what sets the LEM Big Bite apart from other dehydrators. The heating chamber is made from a smooth and shiny stainless steel.

The magnetic cover locks where you lift, making it easy to check on your dehydrating food.

The removable door sets on a track and slides on and off vertically. The real killer feature of the door is the patent-pending magnet locking mechanism that not only makes a tight seal for good air circulation but also allows you to magnetically lock it at any height to check for doneness of each rack with minimal heat loss. 

Banana chips were tasty and sweet, but somewhat tricky to peel off the chrome plated metal grates. We'll use parchment paper next time.

The LEM 10 Big Bite Dehydrator has 10 chrome plated 16 ¼" x 14 1/2" trays. The trays have very small 1/4" square holes - this is great for small chopped vegetables, herbs, and stick-style jerky that can easily fall through larger holes in other dehydrator trays.

If you're making the same recipe on a regular basis, you can speed up the process by setting up to 3 customizable preset temperatures for one button cooking. The user interface is all digital and simple to understand and setup. 

The controls are simple and straightforward. The push buttons let you set a time for 1-24 hours and set the temperature from 90 -155° F. You won't have to go searching for the manual when you want to preserve your favorite foods.  Right by the controls, there is a handy guide for temps and times for dehydrating fruits, vegetables, meat, and jerky. The LEM 10 Big Bite has the fan and heating element mounted in the back of the unit making it a rear-fan system. 

Test Drive

The controls are easy to use and understand. Big easy-to-read LCD displays cook timer and temperature.

Loading and set up: Loading the trays were nice with the very small square holes, not even the sliced mushrooms were falling through the holes. The LEM's digital interface made it easy to enter in the time and temperature we wanted, no confusion at all there.  

Dehydrating: The LEM 10 Big Bite did take longer than the smaller units like the LEM 5 Tray Dehydrator, but the machine is warming a larger area so naturally, it is going to take longer to finish drying. Expect to add an hour or two to dehydrating time compared to smaller units. The tradeoff is worth it when you can fit twice the amount of food in the 10 trays.

Temperature: To make sure our dehydrator was keeping proper temperature, we used a digital thermometer to gauge how well the unit was heating. The LEM Big Bite 10 Dehydrator did well at keeping temperature. When set to 125°F within a 5 minute period, we saw the temperature fluctuate between 117°F and 125°F, so an 8°F variance, which isn't bad all; we did not feel that this variance affected our finished results. A quick note on temperature variances: we feel the LEM 10 Big Bite did great at keeping a good temperature range, especially since it did not go over the set temperature - this could start to actually cook the food and affect the flavor and texture. If your dehydrator is fluctuating 10°-15° above or below the set temperature, you'll start seeing issues with food consistency, longer cook times, and other issues in your finished product.

Dehydrated pineapple chips are a tart and tangy treat! 

Food removal and clean up: The chrome plated racks are going to last longer than plastic, but food likes to stick to the metal a lot more compared to the plastic counterparts. Peeling off banana chips and pineapple wasn't as easy compared to a plastic tray dehydrator. LEM does sell specially cut parchment paper to prevent this issue. I am a big believer in cooking with parchment, it definitely makes cleanup easier. 

Taste Test

The pineapple, mushrooms, bananas, and jerky all came out tasting great from the LEM 10 Big Bite dehydrator. The food was low in moisture and had an optimal dehydrated taste. All the food we taste tested did not have a cooked, oven-roasted taste, which is great. If you have that oven roasted taste, that means you cooked the food compared to just dehydrating it. That's not a bad thing, but sometimes you don't want that cooked flavor and the texture tougher can be off-putting. Because the LEM can keep a good temperature range, the food tasted as it should.

 

The LEM 10 Big Bite Dehydrator is a high-end piece of dehydrating equipment. The all-metal and stainless steel construction will last much longer than plastic counterparts will. The LEM 10 Big Bite backs this up with a 5-year warranty where the competition doesn't come close to a warranty that long. The huge drying racks are going to give you plenty of space for multiple pounds of bananas or the deer from hunting season. The magnetic door is great for keeping the heat in and creating an effective airflow. I wish the chrome plated metal racks were a little easier to clean, but if you use parchment paper, cleanup is pretty easy. If you are dehydrating on a regular basis or need to dehydrate a lot at once, the LEM 10 Big Bite is the best solution.