Just got a food saver


 
C

ChristopherCG

TVWBB Fan
I just got a food saver model 34xx for Father's Day. I've done quite a bit of searching on this forum for some general tips and as usual there seems to be a lot of different techniques.

The manual states that you should freeze for 1-2 hours prior to vacuum sealing. What's the reasoning behind this? Is it to prevent juices from clogging the motor or something to do with food safety? Wouldn't it make more sense to instantly seal the cooked meat as soon as you slice or pull it and then freeze it?
 
My quess is that the food holds it's form better instead of being sucked into the shape that the foodsaver squishes it into.
 
You want food to not be warm for health reasons. If it's cool, bacteria wont grow. If the food is still warm, the bacteria can multiply inside the bag. Make sure your edges are dry when you seal the bag and you'll be fine.
 
The purpose of the pre-freeze is to prevent liquids getting into the sealing section. No liquids - no need to pre-freeze. Or you could just use longer bags.

You should never put hot or warm food into a freezer. Then main reason is that it could raise the temp of the freezer essentially starting to defrost everything else in there.

It's okay to vac-seal hot/warm food right away but then "quick cool" it by running cold water over it or in a pot of cold water. When it reaches room temp or no longer feels warm then put it into freezer.

Bacteria will still grow on cool food, just not as fast as on warm food.

Vac-sealing hot/warm food right away is safer than letting the food cool before vac-sealing as food is not 'exposed' to continuous contamination as it cools. Quick-cooling reduces the time anything sealed in with the food has to grow.
 
<BLOCKQUOTE class="ip-ubbcode-quote"><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-title">quote:</div><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-content">Originally posted by TravisH:
The purpose of the pre-freeze is to prevent liquids getting into the sealing section. No liquids - no need to pre-freeze. Or you could just use longer bags.

You should never put hot or warm food into a freezer. Then main reason is that it could raise the temp of the freezer essentially starting to defrost everything else in there.

It's okay to vac-seal hot/warm food right away but then "quick cool" it by running cold water over it or in a pot of cold water. When it reaches room temp or no longer feels warm then put it into freezer.

Bacteria will still grow on cool food, just not as fast as on warm food.

Vac-sealing hot/warm food right away is safer than letting the food cool before vac-sealing as food is not 'exposed' to continuous contamination as it cools. Quick-cooling reduces the time anything sealed in with the food has to grow. </div></BLOCKQUOTE>

Ok, so it just seems way more logical to vac seal the food when it's fresh. When I put food in the refrigerator overnight in a normal tupperware it really congeals and there is a layer of moisture inside the tupperware. It just seems like it would make sense to avoid this step. Soon as you pull the meat its fresh. Vac sealing at that point just strikes me as the best time to do it. But I am not food scientist so what do I know?
 
I've been using my Food Saver about 10 years now, so I've been down the road. For soup, stocks and hot liquids that one wishes to freeze, I plug the sink in my kitchen, put in the kettle of hot liquid and surround the kettle with ice, then water. It's that temp. zone of about 80-100F where your liquid turns into an incubator that you need to pass through quickly. I can do this with the ice bath in about 25 minutes (with some intermittent stirring of the ice bath). For cooked meats, stews, I'll put them into the proper sized Food Save bag unsealed and then into the freezer overnight. The next morning I'll then seal the bags without the problem of putting fluid into the FS while sealing. I've discovered on rare occasions some food fluid in the FS well(lies just beyond the suction point). Wipe it out; never seemed to affect my FS, but should be avoided. By the way, I've eaten steaks that were FSered in the freezer for three(3) years and I'm still here to tell about it. That's not a recommendation. My MO now, however, is to create a new freezer log of what's in each freezer tray once a year. The log also lets me know what I can have for lunch, exactly where lunch is, and minimize open door time.
 
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