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Storing beans – also known as the poor man’s food save

 
 
 
 
  • Posted by Wakeknot
  • Fri, 02/03/2012 - 11:06

Storing beans – also known as the poor man’s food saver.

My wife suggested this post because she has a skill that she is very proud of and she is quite good at it.  She is fantastic at vacuum packing things.  Now you may think that what that means is that she has a food saver and she uses it to vacuum pack food, but no that is not the case.  

We did have one and much to my surprise it was great at preserving foods in the freezer like meats that previously I had thought of as best eaten fresh, but I had to admit that many things like ground beef were essentially just as good “fresh frozen” with the food saver as they were fresh.  Pulled pork (after cooking) was fantastic, you could just thaw it over night then toss the food saver bag still sealed into a pot of boiling water and a few minutes later you would have moist, delicious pulled pork.

You may notice that this post is done in past tense – that is because while the machine was great, it broke.  

I have always just tossed canning jars of roasted beans in the freezer and never been able to tell the difference between those beans and food saver beans, but for green beans I used the food saver since they tended to stay in the freezer longer.

Once the foodsaver broke, my wife took over.  She would put foods in a heavy duty zip lock bag, insert a straw and suck the air out.  She usually double lines the packing either by wrapping the food in saran wrap first, or using more than one bag, etc.  The net result is something that is really close to vacuum packed!   

She also never gets tired of delivering the joke, “poor you, your wife really sucks” when she seals the bags (note that this is her joke, not mine).

I have not gotten to try a head to head contest between her bags and a food saver one or even the canning jar solution, but it works well for food (much better than just tossing it in a zip lock bag – probably not quite as well as a real food saver) and has to be better than just letting the air wreak havoc. 

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REVIEWS & COMMENTS

  • @HOONCHUL

    Wakeknot | Tue, 02/07/2012 - 15:23

    Interesting I always wondered if that worked well or not. Do they need a different kind of bag than the usual ones?

  • @CHAMIE

    Wakeknot | Tue, 02/07/2012 - 15:22

    it is indeed hard to think of a less expensive solution for storing things. you can even reuse the bags and straws if necessary so it is almost free unlike the foodsaver (where there is always some of the bag lost even if you reuse it).

  • @JBVIAU

    Wakeknot | Tue, 02/07/2012 - 15:20

    I may have to pitch that to her. She doesn't love attention so I am confident she will pass, but she will think the idea is funny.

  • @SON TON

    Wakeknot | Tue, 02/07/2012 - 15:20

    I agree that the mason jars are a great way to go for roasted coffee. I have never tried them for greens, though. for some reason I always look for another solution for those.

  • @INTREPID

    Wakeknot | Tue, 02/07/2012 - 15:19

    It sounds like I better go for a head to head taste test next time and have my wife pit her skills against a mason jar.

  • @AVASERFI

    Wakeknot | Tue, 02/07/2012 - 15:18

    I agree for roasted beans it is hard to do better than just simply tossing them in a mason jar, sealing it tightly and tossing it in the freezer.

  • MY WIFE GOT INTO VACUUM

    hoonchul | Mon, 02/06/2012 - 01:29

    My wife got into vacuum sealing food few months ago but instead of machine she uses the one from ziploc that comes with hand pump. It works great, even though the bags are quite expensive.

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  • INGENUITY!

    Chamie | Sun, 02/05/2012 - 10:29

    I love the ingenious ways that people deal with things. I've thought about vac-sealing things for later use but never could quite justify the expense. A box of straws and a box of Ziploc bags, on the other hand... that's cheap enough to justify the experiment.

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  • DID NOT KNOW THAT!

    Son Ton | Sat, 02/04/2012 - 01:35

    I did not know that you could just use a straw and suck out the air from the zip lock bag! Thank you for the tip! Although I do have the foodsaver, I have never use it for storing coffee as the mason jars are reusable.

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  • WOW

    jbviau | Fri, 02/03/2012 - 14:33

    With a special talent like that, your wife should be on Leno or something! Too funny.

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  • I DON'T KNOW, I DO NOT

    intrepid510 | Fri, 02/03/2012 - 13:47

    I don't know, I do not consider myself a super taster, but I have not really had much luck with freezer beans. I have tried both the way your wife puts the in the freezer and in mason jars and for the most every time they come out after thawing over night they taste old as hell.

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  • COFFEE FOR FREEZING

    avaserfi | Fri, 02/03/2012 - 13:09

    I also freeze coffee. At first I used a food saver and mason jars, but eventually got lazy and stopped running the food saver just filling the jars and sealing, then freezing. I never noticed a difference in quality. I've even experimented with using a vacuum chamber sealer, but haven't found that worth the extra effort either.

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