First time post. Was looking for a vacuum sealer after getting the Anova precision cooker and couldn't quite swallow paying $299 for a Sunbeam food saver at Costco. Saw this one online while trying to research reviews for an Apuro Food Vacuum Sealer after lurking in the breville deal for a while. The specs look quite similar and at $46.55 worth a shot. Only comes with a small number of bags.
Yeah, almost more expensive than the machine itself. Follows a tried and trued business model of cheap hardware, expensive consumable.
I assume you can use any other 3rd party bags or rolls up to 28 cm or a little more
Totally agree - so expensive that I do short 'sous vide' cooks in ziploc-style bags rather than pay the stupid per-metre costs of vac seal consumables.
We 4WD so vac sealed is a must for longer life. Pre cook meals, freeze them, then pop the bag in water to reheat.
Very sensible. Food safety has to be the prime consideration for that. If you're at home, there are more options!
I find I can reuse my bags. Just cut below the seal with a pair of scissors, trying to keep the edge as straight as possible and they will go back into the sealer just fine.
The bag gets progressively smaller each time I do this of course.
My Anova just arrived today.
I was planning to just use ziploc style bags that I bought from Ikea for my chicken and steaks.
Is there a real need to have to buy the vac seal bags?
Are you able to report how well this method works?
From my understanding, that should be fine. I'd save heavier gauge bagging for long cooks.
I use ziploc-style bags for salmon and steak portions.
$100 bucks for 60 meters of bags doesn't seem too bad.
That would have to last a years even doing 2 cooks a week or am I missing something?
Can you tell me where you found the bags at this price? It seems reasonable.
Thanks. Comes up as $140 and $105, but still reasonable and the coupon might work for the bags as well. Would be nice if you could mix the two; you really need both sizes, but it would take 20 years to go through 120 meters.
it appears the nisbets bags are cheaper in packs of 50 when compared to these rolls. That seems strange
If its just for Sous Vide, I think a vacuum sealer would only be slightly better than a ziplock bag.
Vacuum sealed bags:
1)shouldn't come apart at the seams for a long cook,
2)will transmit heat more evenly (no air pockets)
3)you can fit difficult shaped foods like a rack of ribs in a custom vacuum sealer bag.
But the biggest selling point for me is being able to buy meat in bulk (from Costco or the like), portion it into vacuum bags and freeze. Then in the morning, chuck a pack from the freezer into the pot and trigger a Sous vide cook from work sometime in the afternoon.
Isn't the point of Sous Vide that the bags are sealed to the point the no water enters them?
It isn't a matter of degrees, it should be 100% sealed lol.
Sounds great! Possible silly question, why do you need to trigger it from work? Won't the sous vide automatically stop using its timer (if you start it before work) and then you just have a sealed bag sitting in room temperature water until you get home..? Or am I missing something?
Cook time might only be 1.5 to 2 hours. No need to have it cooking 10 hours before you get home.
So start the cook at 8am when you leave and have the timer stop at 10am. How is the remaining time before you arrive home classed as cooking if the water is at room temperature?
@goingDHfast: Hot food vs room temp food. Be pointless to cook it then let it cool then go to the trouble of bringing it up to temp again when you get home so you can eat it, may as well just cook it when you get home.
the real question is: why cook it in the morning (and then have to re-heat when you get home) when you can trigger it to cook at the right time to be ready when you get home?
yes, you could cook in the morning. and if you had a sous vide without wifi, that's what you'd do. but if you have the ability to do things in a more convenient way, why WOULDN'T you use that function?
Got my Anova today as well!! Now to find a vacuum sealer. I was looking at: http://www.kmart.com.au/product/vacuum-food-sealer/763803 anyone bought it?
Works out cheaper than this deal if you go pick up in store
Looks very similar to the apuro and Avancer. Probably out of the same factory.
http://www.nisbets.com.au/Apuro-Vacuum-Packing-Machine/CD204…
But I'm seeing $59 on the K-mart site, am I missing something?
Yeah $59, the Avancer is $15 for delivery i believe
Mine was free delivery, but I'm Metro Melbourne.
The Kmart bags are a expensive $15 for 1.2 Meters (about 12$ a meter).
The Avancer ones are 140 for 60 meters and a slightly bigger bag, works out at about 2.30$ a meter.
I bought some bags from http://www.sous-vide.com.au they are supposedly made in Italy which makes me worry less (lol) about stuff leaking into my food - even though most sous vide cooking is well below the temperature at which leaking occurs …
Couldn't you use Avancer bags in Kmart machine?
Don't see why not. The guy from Sous Vide Au rang me because apparently i ordered the wrong bags (they sell commercial vacuum sealers for hospo)so he's sending me a different kind that can be used on cheapy machines. I guess it just depends if the machine can seal the plastic
It's stated as 600cm (6m) per roll. So that's 12m for $15. Decent price, don't know if I'd be comfortable using it for sous vide.
I've had this one for a bit under two years:
http://www.ebay.com.au/itm/Luvele-Vacuum-Sealer-30M-Bag-Roll…
Paid $90 for it back then with a coupon code, it comes with 30M of bag rolls, and has a built in bag cutter which I find very useful. Use it for marinating and purchasing meat in bulk, one of the best investments I've made in the kitchen for keeping food fresh.
I have an Aldi, friend has avancer. Luvele was the other option I was going to get.
They're all pretty similar and I'm sure they all do the job similarly well. This is a good price for the avancer!
On a side note, the wifi function on the Anova doesn't play nice with IPhone 6 and 6plus…..
Works great on my 6S, shouldn’t be any different.
make sure you dont pair the anova in both the bt and wifi apps. They tend to clash
How does the food taste? Received mine on Monday but still havent even had a chance to cook at home!
done 4x1hr steaks already, definitely takes some trial and error for steaks.
Taste is getting better and better, don't waste your time on thin cuts though, you want at least 1.5in.
Sear for less than 1 min
Looking to do a 4hr steak today before moving on to another protein
@ssjgesus:
nice! planning on getting some scotch fillet from woolworths, then moving onto getting some nice meat from Garys butcher in Prahran.
If only the vacuum seal bags weren't as expensive