Vacuum sealers

[sausage100uk]

Does anyone use a home vac sealer (for food) on a regular basis? Im interested in one as an alternative to tupperware type pots in the freezer and maybe the occasional home made mre for days out/camping.

Are the 40-60 quid ones capable in terms of sealing the bags and pulling a decent vacuum?.

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[Mesquite]

Are the 40-60 quid ones capable in terms of sealing the bags and pulling a decent vacuum?.

In a word - Yes.

I use an Andrew James version and am really happy with it.

The only thing you need to watch out for is food that's 'wet' the liquid can creep up and out of the near the end of the vacuum cycle which can then cause a bad seal.

 

[Janne]

Yes, we have an OBH v. sealer. Agree, be vigilant so the juices do not compromise the seal.
If they get into the machine they will smell.
There are a couple of ticks you will learn quickly, then it is a breeze.

One negative is that the bag material is quite expensive, but as you do not need to use the brand's own you should be able to find cheaper stuff.

 

[Hammock_man]

There are bags which can be sealed and there are bags which are made to be sealed. The best bags have a set of channels in them which allow the air to be extracted even when the bag 90% empty and flat. Other bags will stop the air flow before its all been pulled out.

The cheaper bags will still make a great seal and if you are going to freeze stuff for a week / month are more than good enough. I seal my bags to be used as boil in the bag so do not need the bag to mold exactly to the contents.

 

[Fraxinus]

As per Mesquite I have the Andrew James vac sealer and it works perfectly well, I also got some of their bags at the time which are generally a bit too big for my needs so I cut them down in size and do a double heat seal on one open end then use as normal.
I purchased a Food Saver regular jar sealer later on to seal kilner jars.... I had to improvise the hose connection as it did not come with the attachment, nor was it designed for an Andrew James sealer, however, with some tube and a packet of Eliza Tinsley "Poly Tubing Connectors" and a pack of small plumbing "O" rings from B&Q (at a far lower cost than Food Saver's own tube system) I can now seal Kilner Jars too. Also re-seal after taking part of the contents out for a meal or to add to a camp "MRE" type meal.

Rob.

 

[Janne]

There are bags which can be sealed and there are bags which are made to be sealed. The best bags have a set of channels in them which allow the air to be extracted even when the bag 90% empty and flat. Other bags will stop the air flow before its all been pulled out.

The cheaper bags will still make a great seal and if you are going to freeze stuff for a week / month are more than good enough. I seal my bags to be used as boil in the bag so do not need the bag to mold exactly to the contents.

I use cheaper bags that still have the molded surface, I think you can buy those in Lakeland in UK.
The saving can be quite consuderable.

I bought one roll of unstructured bag material, it was hard to cut and as you say, did not det completely vacuumed!


One tricky part is to get the bottom seal at an 90 degree angle, and cut the opening at the same angle. The first year I did a large number of bags first, then filled them and sealed, but .i wasted quite a bit of the material. Now I do only a few at a time, and try to make them as small as possible. I always double seal both ends, as the bags will get frozen and then transported across a quarter if the world.

 

[tombear]

Thanks for starting this thread as I am about to get a vacuum sealer and all the advice I can get will be appreciated. In fact herself has just found a Andrew James pro vacuum sealer for £54.99 down from £76.99 at their site and I think she's ordering it right now with some of my eBay model money windfall. There's 2 years warranty on it .

I'm especially interested in cheap sources of the bags.

Cheers!

To

 

[Mesquite]

I'm especially interested in cheap sources of the bags.

I buy the vacuum sealer rolls off of eBay.

I can cut off exactly how much I need for a bag as it works out a lot cheaper that way than individual bags,

You can reuse them as well but you need to cut the bottom seal off so you can turn them completely inside out to wash them thoroughly.

 

[Janne]

Lakeland has them, £19.95 for two 28cm x 5.5 meters.
That is truly expensive, here I pay less than 10 USD......

 

[Mesquite]

Lakeland has them, £19.95 for two 28cm x 5.5 meters.
That is truly expensive, here I pay less than 10 USD......

That's why I get them from ebay

 

[Zedara27]

I use this gamesaver model for doing exactly this, I usually buy a lot of meat on bulk (from macro or other wholesalers) and then I vacuum seal, lasts longer in the fridge and for aaages in the freezer. As others have said, getting bags that are the compatible type are a lot cheaper. eBay and Amazon can provide!

 

[tombear]

Cheers, it's got as far as "The Shaw Hub" where ever that is ( a quick Google says Greater Manchester so not far, about 20 miles away and perversely I was in Rochdale earlier just across the M62 from Shaw for most of today. Not that I could have picked it up or owt).

ill see what the material that comes with it is like and then have a look on eBay.

ATB

Tom

 

[Janne]

I used to orally suck out the air from standard plastic bags and tie them when I package my fish in Norway. Lasted well for about 10 months, then started getting frost burn and sometimes a fishy taste.
But I got tired of the Cod Sashimi taste while being a human vacuum machine and bought a vacuum sealer. We are now finishing fish that was sealed in March 2015. Still perfect!

 

[tombear]

I think are next big buy will have to be a chest freezer. We've been very ineffeciant about buying foodstuffs, except cans, in bulk just buying small quanties of meat especially to be used within 3 or 4 days since we tend to shop Sunday's and Wednesday's . We do have a under the counter freezer but it doesn't seam to hold much. We've planted quite a large fruit hedge that's now well established, needs a few more to go in where things didn't take to our poor soil so, this year there should be a Ok crop and once the Hawthorns are a bit taller we intend to fill the spaces underneath them with low growing fruit that will tolerate the shade. There a big patch of wild strawberries out front and I've noticed how good they are at suppressing weeds, nowt seams to come up where they grow, I wonder if full sized ones do as well?

The things now out with the delivery van (Yodel) and has been since 07.42 ( how long before they have real time mapping so you can watch it the red dot moving towards you then lurching off to the side as they make another delivery?). Unfortunately the thunder showers means the windows are shut and since I've yet to get a bell repeat onto the weaving shed floor I'm having to keep the noise down otherwise I could miss them knocking as as happened before.

Atb

tom

 

[Janne]

If you plan to freeze and store lots, I recommend you buy two.
If one breaks down you can just move the frozen food to the other one, after you removed the ice bags. (see below).

I also have a bunch of bags of Ice cubes on the top, to keep the cold in case one breaks down. I check them once every two days, and the ice cube bags should help keeping everything frozen.

You can use frozen plastic bottles you filled with water, or milk cartons.

 

[Nice65]

I've just forked out for a Freshpack Pro, currently on offer.

http://www.fresherpack.co.uk/products/1/1/vacuum_sealer_-_eiffel_freshpack_pro/

Parts are arriving for the biltong box, so I want a machine that is versatile for bag size. This thing pulls .8 bar, can crush a coke can, and will save me a fortune in meat multi buys where I'm always chucking ice encrusted escaped pork chops with freezer burn.