Just me, but I really don't like dehydrating fatty things, really tricky to do right without flavor and texture issues. I will have to dig out a text book, but fat is not something attractive to microbes. Proteins are the most susceptible foods, but fat can actually be used as a preservative, a classic example is confit or pemmican. I have found references that many bacteria can't live in fat, and solid fats don't go rancid very quickly if properly stored. The problem is that Mayo is made with oil, which oxidizes very quickly, and eggs which are high protein, and acid, which leads to a bacterial playground. I wouldn't chance it, because things like potato salad have moisture, protein, acidity and oxygen, leaving time and temp to be the the only safeguards while trying to dehydrate. Freeze drying would likely be better. It is not necessarily the fat in the mixture that will cause you problems, but the combination of the the other stuff.
90% lean ground beef, ham (nitrates turn it an unappetizing black, and I have discussed on this forum in the past how nitrate free is a marketing scam), jerky of different types, are about the limits of my desire to mess around. I have successfully dried canned beans and cooked rice, but didn't really get the idea of trying any of that until I started hanging out here and on the Kboard and playing with my dehydrator. Fatal food poisoning scares me, the runs in the woods are bad enough.
pat
