That's exactly what I was going to suggest. Make a paste first, then dehydrate and powder that.
I haven't done this, so not first hand experience, but if you have lots of garlic, why not try some?

Deanna

Well, I'm giving it a try. Have to say that using a crusher wasn't all that much easier and the result seemed pretty sticky. But if the flavor is good and the result powders easily, it will be an overall gain. Now just to wait for the dehydrator to do its thing...

How about instead of a blender or food processor, you use a coffee grinder? I find a coffee grinder is better for small items that need to be pulverized that will just jump around in a blender...my guess is that you won't have to push it through a seive because it will come out so fine...

Ah, that might indeed be better, especially since the 2nd batch somehow turned rock hard. Not sure why, maybe the type of garlic used. I wonder how hard it would be to get the coffee flavor out of the grinder we keep on hand for guests... And then the flavor of garlic after that...

Anyhow, crushing garlic by hand wasn't less work, alas. The flavor is great. And while I was at it I dehydrated some slices of sweet onion, which were to die for at the leathery stage... Drying them to crispy drove out some of the flavor or something.

I've found that if you add some salt, it really helps the process along. The salt helps draw out the moisture from the cells

So, roughly, a food processor at 3/4 full of garlic cloves, a tablespoon of salt, whir all that up and spread it out on sheets in the food dehydrator, let that dry, then whir it all up again, let that dry on low heat, then whir it up a final time. I suppose you could sieve it, but I've never bothered.

The end result is not all that salty. Someone else once pointed out that you end up with a much better product if you do all this when the garlic is reasonably fresh, not waiting until January of next year after the garlic has been setting around 6 months.

Ok, now I've done another small batch, started before the above response was posted. I sliced by hand and then once it was dry to crispy ran it through the coffee grinder- much better, if maybe a little too powdery. But no real need for sieving! (Note, do not be impatient opening the grinder after grinding, or you end up inhaling a cloud of ultrafine garlic... I know why garlic snuff never caught on!) Next I have to try out David's method and see how that goes. Then maybe I'll have the process streamlined enough to do a big batch. Thanks eveyone!

I just got an e-mail from Mother Earth News on making garlic powder and remembered this post! Here is the link below.

Here is a link that might be useful: making garlic powder

Thanks, Wertach! That looks a lot like the original process I followed. David, I don't know if you'll read this thread again, but the salt did decrease the drying time a lot. But one little hitch I had was realizing that I didn't know what size food processor you used... There's a tad difference in using a tablespoon of salt per 3/4 of a 6 cup model versus 3/4 of an 8 cup model. I made my garlic too salty. But it's ok, it's blended in with the other batches that had no salt.

So the basic process has become: peel several heads of garlic, pulse in a food processor with a still to be determine amount of salt until the chunks are fairly uniform, dehydrate on sheets in dehydrator, take a fork and loosen and turn the chunks once or twice during the drying (they are a bit sticky and will be hard to remove if you let them dry with out moving them at least once, also it helps them dry faster), then once dry (brittle) pulse in the coffee grinder until powdered.

It really is much better than store bought, which I never really liked the taste of.

Ah, that would be a bit of important info - I use one of those 11 cup food processors.

Glad that it worked out.

FYI (though it seems like you've moved beyond this!): rice in the coffee grinder cleans it right up. Salt will work too.

Have been crazy with picking and processing, just thought to check back on this, glad I did! So that would work out to roughly 1 Tbsp salt per 8 cups garlic, great. No mysteries why my little batch turned out too salty :) And thanks for the tip about rice and the grinder, Jessica. I am actually still using it too, it seems faster than my processor. Cheers!