Ingredient Sourcing
Trailtopia takes ingredient sourcing very seriously and a lot of effort goes into selecting the right ingredients to make our products. We use a combination of Freeze Dried and Air Dried (Dehydrated) ingredients for the right balance of flavor, rehydration time, quality and cost.
Most of the Fruits,Vegetables and Meats that we use in our products are Freeze Dried.
So Why Freeze Dried?
Freeze Dried ingredients hold their nutrition, color, shape and texture better than Air Dried (Dehydrated) ingredients. Freeze Dried ingredients rehydrate much faster (in 10 minutes of less with hot water) than Air Dried ingredients which can take 20 minutes or longer, and some Air Dried ingredients must be simmered for 20 - 30 minutes to fully rehydrate. Freeze Dried ingredients are lightweight, 70 - 90 percent lighter than the original weight.
How are Freeze Dried ingredients made?
Simply put, freeze-drying is the removal of water from a frozen product using a process called sublimation. Sublimation occurs when a frozen liquid transforms directly to a gaseous state without passing back through the liquid phase. The process of freeze-drying consists of three phases: prefreezing, primary drying, and secondary drying.
Prefreezing:
Freeze dried food must first be prefrozen at very low temperatures for all the components in the food to be completely frozen.
Primary Drying:
The frozen food is placed in a vacuum chamber that regulates temperature and pressure to remove most of the water through sublimation.
Secondary Drying:
After primary drying, all ice has sublimated but some liquid is still present in the product. Continued drying is necessary to remove the remaining water.