Stockli or Excalibur

[Sheffield_Tiger]

Well, being the tight so-and-so that I am, I bought a £30 round dehydrator from Westfalia and set to drying bananas, courgettes (zuchini if you must), tomatoes etc

Only thing is, cheap is as cheap does, it burned itself out before the first batch

Now, I am keen to experiment further with raw recipes but money doesn't grow on a raw-money-tree in the garden :-(

The stockli seems to be a higher spec round dehydrator, similar to the Westfalia but I would expect, better quality. The Excalibur seems to be the "one to own", but is it more than just a well-known brand?

Any opinions/guidance appreciated on a question which I am sure has been asked before

[artgirly4]

Have had only lil dehy round rinky dinky dehy before....Excalliber to me is all want and more. Amazing!

[klomasius]

Firstly, did you try taking the failed dehyd back? I'd say you are justified in getting your money back if it failed on the first batch!

You can use that 30 pounds to go towards a new dehyd.

For years I used a round dehyd with the hole in the middle, worked fine for my and I used it like a workhorse. It's a Sunbeam. It's still working, I've loaned it to a friend who's just gotten in to raw and he's over the moon with it.

Now I have a big ten tray Igloo which cost me $250 (maybe 100 pounds?) second hand and it also works a charm.

I'd say if you are on a budget, go for the round one, the only irritation for me was that I couldn't make wraps and pizzas without a hole in the middle (I often ended up making mini pizzas which worked out great). I too was/am on a budget and think that there's lots of innovative ways to make lovely raw food with cheap equipment! I'm raw budget queen!

Hope you get a great, working bargain with your next purchase! :D

[lil fairy z girl]

hi i first started with a round one due to price. It was ok but you couldn't do very much in it as the height of the trays limited it. Also I found it a nuisance when trying to do crackers due to the shape. My round one eventually broke, the plastic trays snapped and so i had a while without a dehydrator. Anyway, was umming and ahhing whether to get an excalibur, anyway searched for what offers I could find and although it was still too expennsive for what i wanted to pay i did get one.
Well, there is no comparison between that and the round one. The trays are great, they have a frame which an insert fits in and the food is easy to get off, and to clean. The round one was a nightmare to clean as the trays were brittle. The sheets on the excalibur can bend and so are easy to clean. Also being able to remove trays means that I can now do marinated portabello mushrooms, which before were too high to do in the round one, also I can make a dish of something pop it in and warm it up. Trying out crackers has also been great as its just a rectangle shape, and fruit leathers are ace. There is no comparison in my opinon between the excalibur and the round dehydrator I used to have, the excalibur wins hands down. I try and think that as regards the price i paid, if i divide this by the amount of time i will use the dehydrator, in time it will pay for itself, if it helps me stay raw and gives me freedom to try more recipies then that is a good thing.

sal
~*~*~*

[Sheffield_Tiger]

I see the point of the "fancy" models

£200+ seems a lot of money to pay, but then apply that to an oven to cook food, £200 would be seen as an economy model....so looked at that way, not really that expensive.

But since people have made do with a round dehydrator, and I have since seen a good review of the Westfalia model, I have contacted them to arrange return and replacement for now....hopefully I just got a bad one and the replacement will be better

This is the one by the way
http://tinyurl.com/westfalia-dehydrator

But I think I will save some pennies with a view to upgrading anyway

[Mamoo]

The Westfalia dehydrator doesn't say it has a temperature control. Have you asked how hot the dehydrator gets?

I have the excalibur and love it. I wanted to make sure that I could control the temperature when I used it. It was worth the extra money to me to make sure I didn't kill all my food.

Just a thought. It was probably the hardest purchase I made for this lifestyle, since I couldn't decide how necessary it was. Finally I decided the raw crackers to munch on would be what keeps me raw. And I was right. I needed that raw cracker munch.

[Fee]

I had a stockli and it was ok, you could adjust the temperature but you could not put larger bowls in to warm things through. I eventually put it on eBay having decided that if it sold I would buy an excalibur. WOW what a difference. Things come out so much better than they ever did in the stockli. I love the way I can remove shelves to fit in larger bowls or big stuffed mushrooms. It is also much easier to make regularly shaped breads etc. You can still make circular pizza bases etc by drawing a circle on parchment paper and turning it over before putting your base on.

So my advice would be to save up for an excalibur, you won't regret it.

[Sandals]

If I was to buy an Excalibur, how many trays would I need. I see they very from 4-9. I'm new to this raw food and it will only be me using it.

Thanks

[Revvell]

9.... Look at my other posts concerning this. Not going to take the time to spell it all out again.