I don’t believe I am a person with too many pet peeves. I try not to let things bother me. It’s been said that from a psychological standpoint, there are two types of people – we more or less fit into one or the other category – it’s to the degree that we are in either camp that determines our ability to function in society:
- Those having a neurotic disorder – defined as people who drive themselves crazy.
- Those having a character disorder – defined as people who drive other people crazy.
I think I tend more toward number 2 than number 1 – just ask my wife.
Anyway, one of my pet peeves is wasted food. It drives me batty. So for years I’ve looked at the various vacuum sealer systems with lust, but saw none that seemed practical, at least for me.
A few months ago, I saw the Reynolds Handi-Vac at my local supermarket. They wanted $10 for it. As most vacuum sealers were way more expensive, and the promise of the thing is that the bags for it will be available at my local supermarket rather than me having to mail-order them, I went for it.
I am quite pleased so far.
The bags are more expensive than regular bags, but not by much. It’s simple to use and can produce quite a vacuum.
And the clincher?
I had some cream cheese and had eaten half. My typical experience with cream cheese is I eat half, and within a week, the second half turns into some evil-looking green and grey goo.
I put the half in one of the sealer bags, sucked out the air and put it back in the fridge.
I didn’t touch it for a month.
When I opened the bag, the cream cheese was fine – as if I just opened the box.
Also, while it says it’s only for the freezer, I’ve used it for refrigerated items as well as dry goods.
They also say not to reuse the bags. Although I’d toss any bag that had stored raw meat or the like, I find that you can turn them inside out, give them a rinse, and reuse them – they seem to hold up fine.
If you are doing low carb and you want to cook in volume, then freeze, this can be a big help in avoiding freezer-burn and making it that much easier to maintain your diet.
Give it a look.
Filed under: cooking, recommended products
Cream cheese! Same thing happens to me usually, open it, use half, in a few weeks you have Roquefort cheese. But the air has got to have a lot to do with it, because I very carefully rewrapped the foil casing very tightly over the leftover half the last couple times, and VOILA, even after several weeks, the remainder was as fresh as a daisy and very Earth-unfriendly (“NOT GREEN”).
Speaking of cream cheese, I miss bagels. In a reply I wrote a few days ago, I talked about “bagel Fridays” at work. Anyone doing low carb knows eating a regular bagel would be like eating death for us. When I was first on Atkins, and for a couple years into it, my local health food store started carrying bagels made in the northeast US that were called “Karb Krunchers.” They came in many of the standard bagel flavors, and they tasted like the real deal except they had only 5.7 net carbs per bagel. This was an incredible treat to have, and my wife and I would go through a couple bags every few weeks. It was especially good they kept making them as the Atkins craze started to deflate and Atkins discontinued many of its products (including bagels) since it was headed toward bankruptcy. But eventually, even Karb Krunchers couldn’t support a dwindling customer base and they went the way of the passenger pidgeon as well. Shortly afterward, even the 12 carb Fleishmans bagels disappeared from the supermarket dairy case. Other than smoked salmon and bagels, there isn’t a heck of a lot I can think of that I’d want to spread cream cheese on, so when I tell you I have a half a brick of Philly in the fridge, you can bet it’s pretty darn old. I miss bagels.
Bags: For those of us who are particularly cheap (and face it, with what some of the specialty foods we use cost, you have to be cheap elsewhere), try this alternative to vacuum-sealed bags: put your food in the bag, seal it almost all the way, press out as much air as you can, and then stick a straw through the remaining opening and suck as much of the rest of the air out as you can. It isn’t 100% perfect, but it does work. I’m one of those people who buys the bulk pack meats and splits them into freezer bags at home, and this has been working pretty well for me for years.
Oh, and as to the type of person I am… I am perfectly normal, but you would not BELIEVE how many people with character disorders I am exposed to on a daily basis, it’s like it’s EVERYBODY ELSE and they’re DRIVING ME CRAZY!
Megamas
Yeah, I know, I spelled “pigeon” wrong. How come this thing doesn’t have spell check?!?
-M
You guys are so silly! Okay, I saw the vacuum thingamajig in the store about a month ago and thought, nah, it’ll break in my house. LCC, if you still like it in a month, post it and I’ll get one. My garbage eats much better than me lately. Have you seen those goofy infomercials about the green plastic bags that supposedly keep your food fresh forever? I need to check my other blogs and see if anyone has dared to buy them. I need a new bag!
Denise, I just caught that infomercial a few days ago but have not ordered. They seem to have a sound scientific principle regarding gas absorption.
I don’t know, maybe it’s my fridge, but my stuff isn’t doing so badly. What’s odd is that things seem to last even longer in the winter months. What difference should THAT make? It’s always the same inside the fridge, being a closed environment, isn’t it?
Since Reynolds stopped selling their freezer bags, has anyone figured out how to use the Reynolds Handi-Vac unit with other brands of freezer bags? Someone on eBay is selling the “solution” but I don’t want to pay for it. I’ve bought 2 other brands of freezer bags with the little hole for sealing, and I can’t get the Reynolds Handi-Vac machine to get any air. Anyone figured out a secret?