the aphids were all concentrated on dahlia buds and stem below it. remaining plant was fine. i filled garlic powder in an empty salt shaker, and slowly shaked powder on the affected area only i mean the place below the buds and stem near it.

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.

Don't grind until completely crisp or you will end up with a complete mess(Big ball of garlic)- I know from experience! We make lots of garlic powder and it is worth the trouble I won't buy the comercially bottled stuff any more. We dry ours at 140 degrees and slice it in a food processor (slice attachment) or use a garlic slicer -it is a small Mandoline. Having them all about the same thickness helps the garlic dry evenly. Because we dehydrate and powder most of ours to sell we found elephant garilc makes excellent garlic powder. It grindes up finer / whiter and is much stronger than the fresh elephant. It it so easy to peel and so large and easy to slice in a food processor. We grind ours in a blender. We usually sift it 2-3 times. We tell our customers to keep it in the refrigerator- it keeps it fresh and keeps it from sticking together. If you made more than you think you can use mix some of your powder with freshly dried herbs. There are lots of recipes out there for making your own seasonings. enjoy you garlic powder- you will never want store bought again.

Hope that 'butt' isn't the kind with killer tobacco in it! New Years resolution, save money, save life, give up killer smoking.... Panko is great as a help to add some solid material to a powder, and acts as a filler. Silicone dioxide will absorb moisure that would otherwise cause clumping of the dried mixture. I made a meat rub a couple of times, using hydrolized soy protien, dried sweet peppers, coriander, mustard seed, pepper, dried onion, dried garlic, dried tamarind powder, bay leaf, juniper berries, and several other seasonings. It started to clump and was nearly like cement in the titghly capped jars. After adding a little silicone dioxide it was as dry and as loose as you could get. The rub was put onto a tenderloin roast, and was absolutely the best textured and tasting I have had for a very long time. You could cut the roast with a butter knife. When drying/dehydrating, the faster its done, the more flavor remains. Doing the drying in an oven or with just a fan blowing on it, will not give the highest flavor quality. Also, to help keep in from degrading too much, if its stored under vacuum it will keep flavor much longer too. I do this with herbs like dill weed and after a year of storage, the weed would turn brown and bland. If put in jars and capped with a vacuum (such as from a Food Saver machine and attachment), it will keep much longer. I have some 2 year old dill weed right now that is as bright a green color as stuff that was just picked this past summer. I have tried both Colgin and Writes, and much prefer the smoke from the following source, as it has much more flavor Here is a link that might be useful: Liquid smoke flavor