Vacuum sealer

We are on our second in almost 20 years. First lasted until about a year ago. Done tons of game. Both have been food saver brand. Always use food saver bags. Just bought a new box. 4 rolls and 36 quart bags for $65. I go through 2 of those a year but do a couple deer, Sometimes a bear, tons of chicken from the grocery store, pork, and green beans from the garden. I ve never reused bags, not sure if you can wash or not, but they keep getting smaller if you do.

This new one has a setting for dry or moist. Daughter likes to dehydrate fruits and the dry settling does not crush them.

 

We have a Food Saver. We use it quite a lot too. It’s been reliable. Meats, veg, cheese etc. When we buy big blocks of cheese, we cut the bag large and reseal a few times as we use it. W/ meats, you get no frost or frozen moisture like you do w/ just paper. That’s one of the main reasons for the purchase.

 

I used to have one . Never worked the best. Now I buy the heavier freezer zip bags . I just fill and fold over the ends and seal zip. Have used a folded wet bath towel to squeeze air out before . Anymore it’s about time savings for me so whatever is quick and easy. If it’s in the freezer less than a year it’s fine and most doesn’t last that long. Some Of the bulk case meat we buy is prepackaged and frozen which is nice to not have to deal with .
I’ll be trying the bucket of water next time

 

I bought a Nesco VS-12 sealer at the beginning of the pandemic. So far, I have just used it for meats. I bought a TON of chicken on sale. Trimmed and cut it to how we like, put portion sizes into the bag, then dumped the marinade in and sealed it. Its a little messy, but not terrible. You can rinse the top of the bag, and there is a little cleaning to do on the sealer its self. I then toss them in the refrigerator for a few days, then into the freezer for storage.

I havent used it since, but it will be brought back out once I run out of the first batch. Well worth it IMO.

 

Kerry has a foodsaver and she loves it. She’s freezing corn this morning.

 

I am going to be different. We've had several many years ago. They didn't last long. Didn't seal good. Bags were expensive.
Figured good old freezer wrap was cheaper, quicker, and lasted longer in the freezer.

 

Nice leather work Dennis.

 

X2.. Very nice work

What is her method Jack Straw ?

Chazsbetterhalf and I tried that a couple of years ago, blanched the corn, vacuum sealed it.

But the kernels got very mushy during freezing.

Perhaps too much moisture left on the corn.

We did it on the cob BTW

 

We blanch it, cool it in water, let it dry a bit, we cut it off the ear and freeze it. We always have good success

 

Thx... we will probably give that a try.

 

Good luck! It is awesome to have local sweet corn all winter.

 

We stopped blanching (most things) too. It is supposed to be cheap insurance for bacterias and stopping deterioration enzymes but we are picking real fresh from the garden and washing well, not buying from the farmers market which should be fresh but you just don't know.

 

We have had 2 Foodsavers. The first was a cheaper model and lasted 4 or 5 years. We bought a better model and have had that for 8-10 years.
We buy the rolls of bags and cut them. Primary use is butchering 4-6 deer a year. Sometimes we buy large quantities of chicken breasts or pork chops and freeze those. We have found venison in the bottom of the freezer that is 2-3 years old, and it’s fine.

 

We've gone through 6 vac sealers in the last 10 years, got really tired of bag prices and cost of a throw away machine. Purchased a middle of the road chamber sealer and haven't looked back.

We typically seal 1000-1500 lbs of meat (chicken, fish, beef, pork, etc.) a year and got really tired of the work just to process a wet bag of anything. Chamber sealers don't have that problem.

The initial purchase makes most people fall over in their chair, but the rest of us just laugh when we think of the lunacy of the silly vac sealer we used to use. My 10"x 12" bags are less than 2c each.

Spend a decent amount of $$ and you will get a continuous duty machine with 100% replaceable parts. All of them.

Not saying that foodsavers don't have their place in the world, there's just a better machine out there. We still have a foodsaver, it's just better used sucking mason jars and 30" long bags.

 

How do you do your corn Dennis?