The good folks at Foodsaver were upset that I had a poor experience with the older Foodsaver vacuum sealing system I had borrowed and sent me a brand new unit to test out.
So this weekend I did some bulk cooking as well as some cleaning up in the kitchen from bulk shopping. Talk about night and day difference. There must be something wrong with that unit I borrowed because this new unit is just slick.
Trial No 1: Vacuum sealing 1.5 Lb cooked and seasoned ground beef packs for freezing. This worked great, it sucked a little bit of juice into the drip tray, but it was removable and easily cleaned. I vacuum packed 3 -1.5 Lb bags for use in any cooking in the future and tossed them in the freezer. They sealed up nice and air tight, nothing but a meal waiting to happen.
Trial No 2: Vacuum sealing 5 pounds of bulk coffee beans I got cheap. This is A LOT of coffee beans, but when the price is right… you just gotta figure out how to store it. So I ground some for now and put about 2 Lbs in each large vacuum bag and sealed it up. This worked awesome, it literally sucked all the air out so tight that the package is just a hard bag of beans. This should keep them plenty fresh so I can take it out as needed. The cool thing about these bags is you can open them up, take out a pound of coffee for use now and seal up the remainder again in the same bag.
Overall impression is great, this thing was just plain fun to use. Sometimes trying to be frugal can limit yourself. In this case rather than going out and buying the system at the store, I borrowed an old system from a friend. Luckily the Foodsaver people were nice enough to let me use a new unit to see what I was missing.
I think this could definitely save me some time and money in the kitchen. There is nothing I hate more than having to throw away food that went bad before we got around to eating it. We have gotten better at trying to buy things and use them up, but trying to buy in bulk sometimes puts you at risk of spoilage. I will keep you all updated as I try it out for new uses in the future!
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{ 3 comments… read them below or add one }
Do you think the fact that you received a Foodsaver for free influenced your review of the Foodsaver?
Well, yes and no. I got the first unit that I borrowed for free as well, but it didn’t work worth a crap and the seal leaked after a couple days, which was my main complaint.
It has now been a couple days and the seals are holding strong on the new stuff. This is what I wanted to see. My point in the borrowing one in the beginning was to see if it worked before I spent or wasted 100 bucks on one at the store. While the old unit I borrowed wasn’t up to snuff the new unit worked wonderfully.
I was really excited about the idea of having a foodsaver to begin with and was let down with the first unit. The dedication to service blew me away more than anything. Getting the free unit just made me more excited.
So did it influence it, yes in the sense that without it I never would have bothered to try it again. No, in the sense that if it still didn’t work I would have told you it was a piece of crap like the first one.
I am not getting paid to blog about the item, they sent me a free unit to try. If the unit did not live up to their claims my review would have reflected it.
Thanks for stopping by!
I had one of those old foodsavers and juice from raw meat got under some of the seals and it was impossible to clean the smell out. Now we use the ziploc vacuum thing. Super cheap and so far has done the same job for me. As long as the bags haven't been used on raw meat wash and reuse at least a few times each. I have homemade pumpkin puree that is about 10 months old in perfect condition in my regular freezer.