Preserving/freezing fish-vacume pack

[Tim_T]

I vacuum seal without water and never have any trouble with freezer burn.

[TEE]

The whole trick with vacuum sealers is to remove ALL water and I even put a paper towel folded a couple times right before the seal point to gell all the air and water out.
You can thaw them in no time and NO freezer burn.
I just ate bluegill from last year that were as good as fresh!

[colonelmeyer]

I've noticed when I leave enough of any kind of liquid in the sealer bags that it gets vacuumed towards the seal area. When this happens over time the meat near the liquid in the bag starts to get a bit of freezer burn, sometimes, and at times has even messed up my seal. So I got smart and started sealing with no liquid and as minimal residual blood as I could and that seems to have stopped my problem. I never thought of the paper towl, but I bet that would work good for keeping the juices out of the seal.

[peter]

Below are some comments from Tim.
He recommended a 4 dollar manual "zip Lock" brand pump and bags that Kroger sells in the zip lock bag area. The bags are about 75 cents a piece which is comparable with the bags for the 200 dollar sealers.

I got one and it looks pretty good so far. I sealed a bag of cigars and I don't think I would want it any tighter for fear of crushing the cigars. I filled a bag with water and the zip seal is not leaking.

* A tip from using sprayers. Put a little Vaseline on the seals every so often for more pressure.

This looks goos, might say I'm "pumped"




Here is some info Tim gave me--

I didn't buy the big one, I bought the little pump that looks like it would be used for airing a basketball up. The bags are sold in Kroger and you can get different sizes. It is very simple. Each bag has a vent in the corner, squeez as much air out as you can and then zip up. Then you lay it on a flat surface, but the pump over the whole and pump, it ***** all the air out and is very easy and inexpensive. I use this for fish and game. Right now I have several packs of deer steaks, roast and burger sealed and have been doing this for a couple of years. I even have some wild boar chops sealed in it as well as about 17 quarts of bluegill filets. I have never had anything get freezer burned and I am often still eating deer meat when bow season is coming in the next year.

[peter]

Can you elaborate on "gell all the air and water out" please.
Do you leave the paper towel in the bag or take it out before the final seal?

I guess it is a good idea to dry off all the fish with a paper towel before placing in the bag?

[peter]

Well just checked on my cigars. This thing sucked so much air out of the bag it even sucked air out of the cigars as they now look like wrinkled up fingers that have been in the water too long so I am guessing that that means this is about as much suction as you would ever need. So simple and so inexpensive.

[striperjoe]

I must add to my above post that I waste a few paper towels and actually
pat the fish dry and then seal. It seal great.