What To Do With The Leftover Goodies

With the holidays fast approaching around the corner, we will be wanting to share Christmas with all of our family & friends. As you know while getting together to share the love with our family & friends, there will also be plenty of food for everyone to enjoy.

My husband & I will be hosting our Christmas Eve gathering with my side of the family this year. Everyone will be bringing food; we put it all together & everyone helps themselves. I don't even plan a menu. We make do with whatever we have. After everyone has left, I can bet you there will be plenty of leftover food. The Seal a Meal Vacuum Food Sealer really comes in handy at this time to prepare the food that needs to go into the freezer & eat at a later time.

The vacuum food sealer is my lifesaver so I don't have to waste any food & who wants to eat the same food 2 - 3 days in a row!

Vacuum Sealer Getting a Workout

As you know by now I have been talking about the Vacuum Food Sealer & I can't say enough about it. This time of the year is when my vacuum sealer really get its workout. Since it is the time of the year that we are able to hunt whitetail deer, my husband & I process our own venison.

We will cut up the meat accordingly to make our own raw & dry sausage, roasts, steaks, stew and whatever else we think of. I have to plan ahead to make sure I have plenty of Foodsaver rolls on hand before this time of the year comes around. All of this meat is packaged via the vacuum food sealer & labeled to be eaten at a later time. If we are able we hope to get enough venison for the entire year until the next hunting season comes around.

How Does Food Preservation Work for Me?

There are numerous ways which we can preserve our food whether it's meat, fruit, vegetables or any other type of food. Everyone has their own preference of how they want to preserve food but I have food that the best way to preserve meat, fruit, vegetables and other food storage is by vacuum sealing the food.

I have been doing this type of method for over 20 years now & have had excellent results with it. I find it to be a lot less work involved than canning, pickling, preserving in sugar, or just wrapping food in aluminium foil & putting it in the freezer. By removing all the excess air with a Vacuum Food Sealer, you will extend the shelf life for all of your food a lot longer whether it's to go in the freezer or in your pantry where you would keep your dry foods.

What is a Foodsaver Freshsaver?

Have you ever bought packages of cheese, deli meat, bacon and any other food that you would store in your refrigerator to eat another day? When that day comes around to eat it, you take it out of the ice box to see that it is starting to become a science experiment. Not a good thing. After having this happen to me a number of times, I decided to do something about it.

Since already being a Foodsaver Vacuum Sealer owner, I decided that I would try this new tool out that Foodsaver recently came out with. This is really a neat portable handheld vacuum sealer that definitely keeps your deli meats, cheeses, and other refrigerator foods fresher a lot longer. It’s cordless, compact, easy to use & can fit in a drawer. With its sleek look & comes with a charger, it looks GREAT on the countertop & takes up hardly any space.

The FoodSaver FreshSaver Handheld Vacuum Sealer works great with the new Foodsaver Vacuum Zipper Bags and the Foodsaver Deli Containers. I have used the zipper bags over & over for different foods. I have been really pleased with this handy little tool.

Another Accessory for my Seal a Meal Vacuum Fool Sealer

Another accessory I have that I would like to share with you. You can used your own Ball or Kerr regular or wide-mouth mason jars In order to vacuum pack liquids, fragile foods and dry goods with the Foodsaver Jar Sealers. The jar sealers come in two sizes – Regular and Wide-Mouth along with the hose include. I purchased 50 lbs of shelled pecans 3 years ago & stored them in mason jars with the Foodsaver Jar Sealers. The pecans are still just as fresh today as the day I put them up.

Two or three years ago while in Target, I purchased a FoodSaver Handheld Canister Sealer that comes with a charger as shown in the picture that does the same thing as the hose connected to the port on the Foodsaver Vacuum Sealer to the Jar Sealers. With this handheld sealer, you would put the end of it directly into the Jar Sealer or any of your Foodsaver containers that has the hole in the top of the lid; push the button on the sealer & a green light comes on letting you know when all the air has been removed from the container.

Since having this handheld sealer, I no longer use the hose attachment process. This is so much easier & quicker. I keep it on my kitchen countertop at all times & it’s ready to go whenever I need to use it.

Accessories for a Vacuum Food Sealer

As you know you can’t use the Seal a Meal Vacuum Food Sealer unless you have the accessories to go with it. There are different kinds of accessories available based on the how you plan to store or freeze your food. There are Foodsaver Quart BagsFoodSaver Rolls and a variety of FoodSaver Containers. The bags also come in pint and gallon sizes.

I personally have always used the rolls so I can make my own size of bags to store my freezer food. The rolls come in 2 sizes 8"and 11"wide. I keep both on hand at all times. I make the bag or bags based on what I’m planning to freeze at the moment. I always make the bags larger so they can be reused again & again. After the first time of using the bag, I wash it with hot soap & water, rinse it & let it dry very well before storing it. I write on the portion of the bag that is outside of the sealed area with the name of the contents & date so I know how long I have had it in the freezer. When opening the bag, I cut just below the sealed line & it removes the written label. The next time I use the bag & after sealing it, I write the name of the contents & date again & it is never written on the body of the bag.

The containerscome in variety of sizes. I used these to store products like macaroni, spaghetti, powdered milk, cornmeal, and any other dry ingredients as shown in the picture that doesn’t need to be refrigerated or frozen. One thing about these containers is that you can remove some of the food you have stored in it & reseal it again & the food will stay fresh.

Which Seal a Meal Vacuum Food Sealer should I have?

The first question you should ask yourself is what size of Seal a Meal Vacuum Food Sealer should I get? Some of the best vacuum sealers on the market are compact in size, which is suitable more towards singles and couples with no children who only wish to seal small portions of food. If you have a large family or like to buy food in bulk, you should try reading a larger vacuum sealer review to see if those would be right for you.

The best Seal A Meal Vacuum Food Sealer also don't necessarily come with plastic bags to wrap and seal everything in. You will see that a new generation of sealers has cropped up that instead use traditional-looking food canisters to vacuum seal your food. A small hose is attached to the special sealer lid and all of the air is sucked out just like the more familiar plastic bag sealers.

Could the new canister sealers be the best vacuum sealers on the market? Again, that depends on your preference and needs. If you plan to seal things that don't traditionally go in plastic bags, such as cereals, grains, soups or anything with liquid or syrups, then the best vacuum sealers may very well be the new canister sealers. However, if your needs are more for freezing or you need the refrigerator or freezer space that comes with flat packages, then the more traditional bag sealers is likely your most logical choice.

If you read a page of Seal A Meal Vacuum Food Sealer reviews, you will see a myriad of manufacturers—from the original Tilia FoodSaver to the newer Rival, Deni, VacUPack and Seal-A-Meal varieties. Though they all function similar—to preserve your food by taking out the air from it—they all have a different look, aesthetic and features to them. You should read through the vacuum sealers reviews and find the one that best fits two things- your budget and your needs. There is really no one set of best vacuum sealers being sold by any manufacturer today—it is simply a matter of individual preference, needs and of course the bottom line—price.

Source: The Vacuum Sealer Shop