Pam, you and Jim are just the "bomb". You combine your scientific knowledge with common sense. Also, your sense of humor is killer. We can never thank you and Jim enough for all you share with your community. ❤

Oh my goodness just about everyone who reconstitutes freeze dried foods literally eyeballs the water really according to what they like. Thank you for being so gracious to the cry babies. Love your channels ❤

Well, people are lazy and want you to do the work for them. You do a great job. Don't listen to those people! I have learned so much from you and respect your knowledge!

It was so lovely to see the joy on your face after solving the 'problem'.....:) xxx

This is wonderful, and you Pam, and Jim are wonderful !!! You have given me the courage to both start pressure canning, and also to purchase a freeze dryer. Your willingness to share youre infinite knowledge has changed my life. I can’t thank you enough

You, my dear, are just a treasure trove of knowledge. I enjoy your videos very much and I feel that your science while it is over my head is very valuable, and I also appreciate your candid sense of humor. You do you! I will continue to watch because I enjoy you both.❤

Thank you and Jim for all you do for the freeze drying community (actually all of us) and the common sense you apply. Love this recipe. You are loved!

Thank you for the information. I dry all my vegetables from my garden, all my spices like basil, etc…and have done eggs, snacks, ice cream sandwiches, and a lot more. You just took the worry out of cream cheese. Thank you for being so knowledgeable.

Thank you for the very helpful video. I do have a couple of suggestions. 1 Never let the vacuum pump turn off while there is a vacuum in the chamber. This will eliminate any chance of vacuum pump oil being sucked into the chamber onto the food. Number 2 will support this procedure. 2 Never let the freeze dryer officially finish and hold the food frozen. This can be done by setting the extra dry time to 24 hours. At any point during this time, the food may be checked by "pausing" the freeze dryer. A open the drain valve, after 5 seconds turn the Vacuum pump off with the switch on the pump itself B Weigh the food, otherwise check it, or rotate the trays close and latch the door C Close the drain valve then turn vacuum pump's switch on The freeze dryer should continue processing where it left off. At any point in the extra dry time the batch may be be ended by using the cancel button. Again, I thank you for all your informative videos.

I fell in love with you at Rose Red Homestead, and now I find you over here. Yay! I so appreciate your commonsense, practical approach to food preservation and economical living. Sending you all kinds of love! Thank you for sharing your knowledge and experience!

I have my freezer dryer for a little over a month and I am having a blast filling our pantry shelves with long term food for our family. I will be adding powdered cream cheese to the pantry. Thank you and Jim for all of your instructional videos. Have a blessed day.

Great video Pam and Jim. I am not mathematically inclined so I just do the eyeball method and wasn’t sure what I would do when I need a “cup” of the product. Thank you for going through this whole process. I can now powder a whole tray (or 4), put in a jar and know how much to use for a given recipe. And do it for other food items too! You two are the best!

❤ to everything within the first 5 minutes !

Well Done! I am proud for you too!

This is so exciting! I'll be buying 12 cream cheeses to put in my freeze dryer "Mr. Cool"! Thank you both from the bottom of my heart for all the work you did for this video

You are so smart, gracious and fun! Thank you for sharing your skill and knowledge! Love from Oxford, AL

Oh rose you need to link this to the rose red channel. I would have come here also a long time ago for freeze drying! Thank you!!

My sister asks me all the time how long to dry items, how long to rehydrate, how much water to rehydrate, and I keep telling her “I just fly by the seat of my pants”, lol.

Great video! I never thought to FD cream cheese. A new project! We always add 12 hours to the process just in case things finish while we are sleeping or gone from the house. When we are ready to check the food, we simply cancel. This avoids our finished food from refreezing, which indeed would add more moisture.

I ran out and bought 10 lbs of cream cheese so I could freeze dry it. It took about 35 hrs and turned out amazing. I now have 5 quart jars of cream cheese powder sitting on the shelf. Thanks for the information. Great job!

😆🥰 Thank you SO much for doing this, Ms. Pam. I have been wanting to start freeze drying dairy. This video has me set on a more correct path in my thinking, storing and how to rehydrate! I never would have considered hot water, because we think of cheese as a cold product that is then melted. Thanks for this critical thinking skill!

Thank you for figuring out it needs boiling water. Now I know how to do this as well as sour cream and such.

We’re new to the freeze drying world! My wife and I purchased our Harvest Right on March 7th. We just watched your video and can’t say thank you enough because we go through cream cheese! 😁

heavens to mergatroid! You are one hardworking, brilliant lady!!!

Thank you for this! Now I know how to reconstitute my buttermilk..with hot water!

I have freeze dried a lot of cream cheese, sour cream, yogurt, shredded cheese, heavy cream, ice cream sandwiches. Cream cheese is one of my favorite, comes out as a powder and rehydrates perfectly. 😊 Don't worry about being precise on your freeze drying items as you might have a exceptionally muggy day and not need as much water as you would on a very hot dry day. People look for any reason to ridicule and cause another unneeded grief. Be yourself show your failures and your wins and that makes you human in perfection❤

Pam you and Jim are awesome ❤❤

Prof Pam⚘️ You are Wonderful... You Always teach us...I felt like I was back in my nursing lab 😊 Thanks Prof Jim, great video.. Blessings❤ Always #teamcantrell

It will thicken as you chill it - so refrigerate just as all cream cheeses are kept.

so exciting to learn about the hot water - I had a cow, we fdd cream, cream cheese, yogurt etc and the texture was always horrible . . . lol I used cold water!!!!!

Excellent video Jim and Pam.

Great trick with the hot water...

Thank you dear . I’m gonna do some cream cheese . GODBLESS sweetie

Love your excitement when you figured out your reconstituting dilemma!

As an engineer I loved all the math lol.

I can't believe anyone would complain about you not being "scientific " enough for their liking! I appreciate you going through the trouble of trying to please these pains in the backside, but if I were you, I wouldn't have bothered! What's that old saying? You can please some of the people all of the time, you can please all of the people some of the time, but you can't please all of the people all of the time. Just do you, and the people who love your channel will be satisfied with everything you and Jim bring to the table! 😊 Thank you for sharing your knowledge.

Thank you so very much!

Smart thinking! So thankful for your scientific minds!

Oh my goodness, I’m so happy you did this experiment. My cream cheese reconstituted was always grainy. Thank you so much for your scientific mind. I’m now going to reconstitute some cream cheese using boiling water. 🎉🎉🎉

We are like you we just ball park it and we have always been find get videos

You two are a godsend. Thank you so much for all time you spend doing emergency preparedness & sharing with us. I am just beginning to freeze dry a few items. Is there a reason you use glass jars vs Mylar bags? Thank you so much!

Rewatched after the Schmear video. The Boiling water is so nice to know. I've FDd cream cheese now. I looked at your videos and you've not FDd cheese. I've grated my cheeses I've bought in bulk. Some people comment it doesn't rehydrate to be like cheese and am thinking about the hot water. Need your scientific input for adding FDd cheese into recipes.

Thank you for your experimenting. I have some freeze dried cream cheese and now know how to reconstitute it properly - boiling water! I don't measure anything either - but will start with these measurements you have calculated. Again - thank you!

Thank you so much for this video. There is a sale on cream cheese this week, I think you know where I am going with this! Thank you, thank you! suzie

Wow, watching this just about sold me on purchasing a freeze dryer, lol. Thanks for sharing there is dry cream cheese powder. Thanks for all the giggles during the video. This was fun, yes!!

I have been watching your RoseRed Homestead channel for a very long time. I don't know how I missed that you have Trail Grazers too. I just got a freeze dryer and trying to watch videos to learn. This video is amazing. I am excited to try cream cheese and learn more from you. Thank you for sharing all your amazing knowledge!

Thank you :)

I always reconstitute with boiling water. I have a bunch of cream cheese in the fridge for my daughter to make me some keto cheesecake, so this is good to know. Thanks. I noticed you changed your channel name, too.

Thank you. I have been waiting for a cream cheese video! I appreciate your work.

Hi have you tried using warm water, then let it set in the icebox.?..GOD BLESS

Pam, you (as well as Jim) are truly a treasure to this community ... as well as Rosered Homestead. ❤ I love the way you handle the snarkiness ( for lack of a better word) of the occasional poster who can't find a real reason to criticize, so they resort to trying to bully. Brava for accepting their challenge so brilliantly with great results after using "all of that scientific knowledge" that you possess. I admit, when you mentioned that you were freeze-drying cream cheese, the first thing I thought was that it would turn out grainy. I have frozen it and it never gets back to that smooth creamy consistency ... it's OK in dips and cheese balls that have other ingredients, but I haven't baked/cooked with it. Which leads me to this 😊 Would you be willing to try cooking with reconstituted cream cheese? Maybe just a simple pasta dish or some soup? It seems that when I add it (NOT freeze-dried) to my Broccoli 🥦 Cheddar Soup 🍲 it always looks like it's curdled. 🤷‍♀️

Thanks Pam! You’re a great teacher. Awesome to see everything worked out! I don’t set my extra drying time for 2 hours but for 12 hours. That way it keeps drying and not going into freeze mode adding moisture

Great video. I just took my cream cheese out of the freeze dryer and did the calculations. Mine came out to 120 grams of water per 8oz of powder. A little puzzled by this and i went back and looked at the weights of my cream cheese prior to putting it on the tray. The package says it weights 226g. But the actual weight in some cases was much less. So mystery solved. Either way it came out great!

Excellentip about rehydrating powedered FD cream cheese with super hot water to melt the fat! Wow... I' do the method of more time till it no longer changes or drops... I measure/weight at each point.. I've never ever had any tray gain weight..

Thank you! I have lots of cream cheese in the fridge and hadn't even thought of freeze drying it. I appreciate you and Jim taking the time to share this info.

Humidity moisture in the air makes a huge diff in rehydrating ,I assume

Your cream cheese revelation was genius!

Awesome!!! Love this. Thank you

Awesome. Thanks for show this.

excited about getting my freezer dryer and doing this

You are awesome! Thank you so much for all your hard work. It makes my work so much easier.

Great info and I’m so excited for the cream cheese. Thank you

Absolutely fascinating. The commenter who thought you weren't scientific sure does not understand that even humidity in the air can affect baking or dehydrating. Your scientific ballpark is great for all the rest of us! I am going to share this video with my freeze drying siblings. Thanks for all this detailed analysis.

love your channel I always learn something new thanks 🙂🌻

❤ great discovery! Nice work!

Awesome 🎉 thanks

This is so exciting!! The knowledge is immeasurable and priceless! Thank you both. …And keep YOUR style the way that works for YOU. ~Sharon from Florida

"Perfectly smooth!" Loved seeing the joy of an experiment working out.

Just added cream cheese to my "to do" list! Thanks again for all that you two do to educate me!

I just love that you worked through how to get cream cheese shelf stable! Now, we can add to our food storage, and have a luxury that I thought was impossible before. Thank you, Pam! ❤

Brilliant!!!!!

Do you use an oxygen absorber in the jar before you vacu seal?

Bravo!

Good job Rose. I just got a FD and just did ice cream sandwiches which turn out wonderfully and now I want to do cream cheese. Thanks for doing all the work.

Awesome video Pam & Jim!

what brand is your can sealer?

Thanks for all that work. Humidity and other factors go in to this, which you are aware. Going by seat of my pants seems to work fine for me. Like making bread flour will never be the same. Hot water makes total sense. Thanks

JUST PURCHASED MY FREEZE DRYER, HAVE NOT GOTTEN IT SET UP TO USE BUT WILL IN A DAY OR SO. THANK YOU

I love your channel. I have a question, I noticed that a lot of people mark their freeze dryer pans. My question is what kind of marker do you use to mark your pans. Like just a regular sharpie or would that taint the taste of the food?

I wondered about the fat content not emulsfying when you were tasting the first batch! Yay me...I'm learning and thinking through things!

Do you pre freeze?

Thank you! I was wondering if this was possible but hadn’t tried it yet.

I'm sorry that you and Jim have to deal with rude people... If someone doesn't like your channel or happy with the way you do things, they don't have to watch! Don't sweat the small people, you keep doing you Ms. Pam.. You are amazing(Jim as well).. You both rock.. please don't entertain the snide remarks or explain yourself to them.. Just consider the source and be done with them. However, I did enjoy seeing you in your element... The amazing teacher in you never leaves you.. Thank you for making learning fun and easy,, even for someone like me!! Enjoy your weekend.. Stay and healthy and be safe. ❤ (COVID is horrible.. my husband and I both have it🤧)

YES, please!!! 😋

Are you in Arizona?

I do weigh my stuff , but mostly to see how much they have lost, rehydrating, the seat of my pants works pretty good. lol. we all do it differently. good video, the cream cheese and hot water would have baffled me. thanks to you and Jim.

I’m not wanting to be argumentative - like you said we all need to follow our own path. I feel confident that for long term storage of freeze dried food as close to zero moisture is the only acceptable measure. There are dangerous “germs” (fungus) that don’t need a lot of moisture but can and will survive on a tiny bit and ruin, perhaps make unhealthy moist packed food. I love all you brings and find myself thoroughly confounded with your freeze drying approach. I’ll keep going for zero! PS, consider changing your default dry time to avoid getting any moisture from the melt-refreeze processing.

I rejoice with your end experiment. You are genius. Experimenting is the best way and takes less time..lol

❤

I think I would have done a million times better in school if I had you for a science teacher.

However, "ballpark" didn't work at all for the cream cheese frosting you attempted to make for the scones.

Hooray! You solved it. You are a treasure.

As a freeze drying person myself, it is not precise. It is like cooking. You mess with it until you are satisfied.

I love this idea. Honestly, I have several bags of this already but I'm going to do more. I picked up a 20 lbs tub of cheeseball from an outlet which I put in "Elsa" with the plan of making cheese spred when reconstituting.

Thank goodness! I freeze dried whole milk and was very disappointed by that grainy texture! I could only use it for cooking but not for drinking.

Will it ever end? Love what you do. I was thinking that you would have to cool the final product but didn't think about adding boiling water. Great job.

👍

Love, love, love the experiments and ideas! I did go to your store, and noticed a small spelling typo…I know you must be tired, but wanted to point this out: thanks much for all you do! Shredder & Attachment…(see below copy) Kitchen Aid Fresh Prep Slicer Sherdder Attahment

Pam your teachings have helped me so much. Could I use the same process with sour cream?

Excellent video. My FD sour cream rehydrates grainy. I will use boiling water to rehydrate next time. I'm anxious to FD cream cheese.