vacuum packing food

[Talbot]

We have several times made use of our local butcher who will vacuum pack meat, and it always lasts much longer. We are considering purchase of a machine to be able to do this for vegatables etc as well as meat. Does anyone have any experience/advice/recomendations on machinery

 

[DinghyMan]

Got one from Tchibo a couple of years ago and used it for vacuum packing food and other stuff when Kayaking. Was about £12 or thereabouts, watch out for price and availability of refills for the plastic though as they can be pricy.

 

[kandoma]

the "el cheapos" did not work for me. There are several machines on the market, which are doing it correctly. The price is in the range of +- 100£. They use two wires to close the bag and use special bags (they have small channels inside to allow to suck the air out). The price of the bags and the machine was in my opinion to high, so I refrained from buying it. I got meat from friends packed with such a machine and it looked ok.

A starting point is on google with "magic vac"

Peter

 

[peteandthira]

talbot

We gave ours a decent burial at sea. It was quite a good one (30 quid) but was so much of a faff getting the air to suck out before the seal worked that we simply gave up and ate the food before it went off.

Pops

 

[chuzzlewit]

I wouldn't rely on amateur vacuum packing to preserve food. Clostridium botulinum thrives in anoxic food.

 

[Omatako]

Whilst this may be off the exact track of this string, there are a lot of foods these days that have unreal shelf life.

For example, have a look at this site: http://azaadfoods.com/html/home.htm. I have no idea where they're globally available, we buy them freely in New Zealand.

We have used these products at home just as quickie meals and they are really great. And they have an unrefrigerated shelf life of twelve months.

I have no connection to this product other than being a really satisfied user.

Also there is the alternative of irradiated food (no it doesn't glow in the dark) although this stuff is pricey. It has a seriously long shelf life as well.

 

[Roberto]

talbot,

I have one supposed to work with almost any film, price roughly 80euro (don t remember exactly) I have almost finished the roll provided with the machine and still can not get a satistafctory result: when just done, the packets are correct, but after a couple of days air enters inside the bag, so they are not of a great help /forums/images/graemlins/mad.gif

btw, I personally would like to use it more to preserve rice, coffee, pasta etc (but also engine filters and other components which I usually keep in the bilge) from humidity rather than preserving food, if I only could manage to use the bl..y machine