I see all these “vacuum” bags they sell in the stores. Apparently they have these home appliances that will vacuum seal up food in a bag.
They aren’t cheap–the deluxe foodsaver costs over $120 on amazon
So–what are these things really for? Are they worth it? Right now I just use glad freezer bags to save anything.
I love mine. No more freezer burn (there’s always a little more air left in freezer bags, although of course they work fine). I like to buy big packages of chicken breasts, mix up a marinade, and vaccum seal them in portioned sizes so when they defrost they’re already marinated. They do do better than the Ziploc bags just because they get more air out. Not necessary, but nice to have.
I’d try the Reynold’s Handi-Vac first. You can buy 'em at Target or WalMart or even some grocery stores, and for $10, it’s worth it.
I have one, as well as a traditional $150 vacuum sealer. The Vacuum Sealer does a better seal, but the handi-vac wins when it comes to convenience and cost. Plus, the handi-vac uses ziplocs, so you can open 'em, take one of whatever out, then seal it up again.
That said, I have had some issues with the handi-vac bags staying vacuumed at times.
The traditional sealer is a bit of a pain to use (it’s finicky, you have to place things juuuust right) and the bags are expensive. Also, you have to seal things in whatever portions you think you’re going to use, since you can’t easily re-seal them.
I love mine and use it all the time, but I’m not sure how cost effective it is. I am able to buy large quantities of meat and freeze it without worrying about losing it to freezer burn, but the bags are rather expensive. I’ve never done the calculation on how much it costs me for supplies, but it certainly has reduced the amount of food I have to throw away because it’s gone bad. Cheese will last for months in the refrigerator in a sealed bag. I also use the sealer to reseal bags of chips, cereal, or other items that come in plasticy bags.
Am I the only person, who uses his lungs to vacate the air out of a zip-lock bag? It doesn’t get 100% of the air out, but I get enough out that my food doesn’t frost up.
I’ve done that! 
It’s kind of icky with meat, though. I’ve used a straw before, too. Mostly I just press out the air.
I’ve wondered about those vacuum sealers. The bags are VERY expensive. I didn’t know you could use Zip-Locs with the Reynold’s sealer. It has its own bags, too, and they are expensive as well.
That’s my method – seal it, open a little hole in the middle of the seal, and just suck it on out of there. 100%? No, but in the high 90’s. Works just fine by me.
Looking at 'em online, I get the impression that it’s not that you can use any old zip-locs (whether they’re actual Ziplocs[sup]®[/sup] or whatever you’d call the competition) with the Reynold’s sealer, but that the Reynold’s bags have press-seals or zippers or something on them so you can reuse them. Or at least reseal them after opening. IOW it looks like their proprietary bags are basically zip-locs with a little extra port for the vacuum device. Athena, is that right?
And to you lung- and/or straw-users: I ain’t breathing up no raw meat-juice air, thankyouverymuch. That would work fine for veggies and such, though.
If you don’t want to suck in meat juices, put the bag in a bowl of water. The water will squeeze all the air out and you can zip it closed.
I don’t think zip locks hold the vacuum as well. After a few days it seems there will be more air in the bag. I don’t think you can count on a zip lock holding the vacuum for any significant amout of time. However, the Reynold’s Handi-Vac bags hold the vacuum very well. I’ve had bags sealed for months and they still look perfect.
One good thing about the vacuum sealer bags is that they totally hold all the odors in. Normal zip lock bags can leech odors.
Yeah, that’s what I meant. You have to use Reynolds proprietary bags with the Handi-Vac. Sorry, I tend to use “ziploc” as a generic term for bags-with-zips on the top.
I got one for Xmas last year and have mostly liked it.
We do have problems sometimes with stuff losing vacuum in the freezer if it gets knocked about at all.
Can you, or do you, wash and reuse the Reynold’s bags?
What brand or type is it?
I’ll have to look and let you know tomorrow. I’m drawing a complete blank right now. :smack:
I have the foodsaver and absolutely love it. There are just two of us, and it makes it so easy when I make up a big batch of spaghetti or whatever to divide it up and freeze it. I also buy big bags of chicken thighs and divide it up 3 to a bag and that lasts for a couple of months. The bags can be pricey, but can be reused if not used for meats. I highly recommend it–I’ve also used it to reseal chips, crackers, etc. (mine is the foodsaver v2480–purchased about a year and a half ago).
My local Safeway had the Reynolds Handi-Seal on sale for $4.88 last week, and it came with about 4 bags. I bought one and it seems to work so far. I’m trying to decide whether to invest in a real Seal-a-Meal.
We bought a foodsaver this past spring, and love it. We raised a big garden and some hogs and chickens, so we need to be able to store our food longer than most. They are finicky sometimes, and I’d estimate about 5% of the time the seal is lost. We just eat that stuff up first.
A few tips:
Don’t buy the bags, buy the rolls. That way you can make the bags any size you want. But your bags/rolls at Costco or on-line in large quantities. They don’t go bad, and you get good discounts for quantity. I think we paid around $6.50 for a 18 foot roll. Don’t buy cheap off-brand bags/rolls. The foodsaver ones are (IIRC) 7 layers thick and very tough. The cheap ones will lose vacuum. You can reseal the bags - just make them extra large so you have enough material left to seal them a few times. You can wash and re-use the bags if you’re very frugal. I just do this for bags that had dry stuff like bread in them. The containers are handy for things like cereal, cookies, and crackers so they don’t go stale.
Most importantly, keep it handy - it will do no good packed away in a cabinet. If it’s on the countertop you will be more likely to use it.
What I bought:
The Foodsaver system with the canisters and jar sealer attachment that I was expecting to use for canning and sealing up salad mix daily, etc. (Didn’t go for the marinating size units.)
What I (mostly) ended up using it for: splitting up bulk meats into smaller portions for freezing mostly, but still I feel by buying the bags on a roll (as previously mentioned) this saves quite a bit of money and I’m really happy with it. (Or does it? Buying the special bags probably works out to about the same.) I do use the canisters when I have something odd-sized like fresh pineapple I want to seal up, but I never did get the hang of sealing actual canning jars and stuff like in the infomercials. (Not to the extent that I trusted, anyway.) I’ve had mine for more than 5 years and it’s more than paid for itself I’d say. I actually saw one at a thrift store for $3 the other day and tried to get my mom to buy it and for some reason she wouldn’t. I would’ve bought it as a spare if I’d had room in my suitcase (it was a newer model, lol) but I was pushing my limit as it was.
I have one, picked it up some time vaguely a year ago and love it,
its not really for every day use, at least I dont make a meal and then seal up the left overs. you eat those soon enough.
6 quarts of chili? bag it up, the same with any soup type food,
make a HUGE batch of roasted veggies, freeze them up in single serving sizes,
8 pounds of pot roast slow cooked in the crockpot? again single serving portions.
I do this with all kinds of stuff and my freezer now has dinner options built in, pot roast and roasted veggies? hell yeah. pulled pork and rice w/veggies? alright…its great for that.
one tip for freezing soups and other high liquid foods you should freeze it first then bag, and for that purpose I use
http://www.boscovs.com/StoreFrontWeb/Product.bos?assortmentDepartmentNumber=7059910&assortmentId=4&itemNumber=23298&type=Product
9"x3"x2" is the perfect size for the large bags and if you fill one then split it in the middle you end up with 2 of the smaller bag portions. you can also adjust portion sizes by filling them more or less.
the bags you make should be about 1/4-1/2 inches longer than a standard disposable pen.
make the bag, then with a fat permanent marker I usually date/name the food. then after I make as many bags as I need I start sealing up food.
Why? Because it’s hard to get frozen liquid out of a bag without thawing it, or it is a quality issue, or something else?
in part because the vacuum pump will suck out liquid just as happily as it does air (to a lesser extent) so when you are sealing up food it can make a much bigger mess
and the other part for me is that bricks of food stack much more neatly than random lumps of food do.