There are so many vacuum sealers on Amazon with high ratings that I’m thinking I can only trust the negative reviews of the highest rated… but that get’s you nowhere. So I thought I’d bring the question to my most trust site.
I want a vacuum sealer that…
Is not too expensive
Has easy to find bags
Does not require specialty bags
Is reliable and durable
Any recommendations?
Same one I have and it’s great IMHO.
What brand is it @brewmanchu ? Looks like a printer 
We have a Food Saver. It was left to us by the guy we bought our condo from. I assume it was for fresh caught fish. I have not tried it yet so I don’t know how well it works. Any of you guys have one?
He also left us a boat load (pun intended) of fishing equipment. Haven’t caught enough to need to feeze but had a lunch or two of yellow tail snapper.
https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B004HESL74/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_search_asin_image?ie=UTF8&psc=1
I bought this foodsaver off amazon in June 2015 for $68.99. Still works great. Occasionally it will sound as if it’s laboring to vacuum the bags but a good blowing out with compressed air seems to get it back on track. It’s also worked with all the builk bag material I’ve purchased over the years.
The Foodsaver looks pretty nice. I like that has reusable containers and bags(?) I assume that is what that bottle is for… to pump out air from the reusables
Correct. You can use that tool for reusable. I have the same one for 10yrs and have never had a problem.
This one can also vacuum seal other containers with the capability of being sealed. Like mason Jars for example. I’ve never used that feature. So you could vacuum seal a mason jar full of hops allegedly…
I get the roll of bag material and cut off what I need as I use it. When I bag hops I’ll use a longer than necessary bag depending on the quantity of hops and frequency/volume of use. Then I’ll cut just below the seal of the bag to access what I need and then seal it back up. So from that perspective the bags are reusable yes.
The Food Saver we have is an antique compared to that. I have the instructions and some bags so we can figure it out.
That mason jar feature is pretty amazing as well. I think I’m sold on the Foodsaver system. Now the real negotiations we be with my apartment’s space saving system, aka my wife. I see they make a handheld model that doesn’t do the sealing part but will do the reusable containers part. I might be able to get away with that. Has anyone done a marinade under vacuum? Does that really speed things up? Looking for a more complicated sales strategy if needed… “But wait there’s more!”
Here is one to sell it. It’s also good to freeze food. Less freezer burn and shrinks the package size down.
Leftovers become a freezer arsenal of quick meals. You can seal and save anything with it pretty much. I’ve even batched out tomato sauce, chili, and stew. Pair it with a sous vied gizmo and it’s easy meal time. You can buy in bulk and break it down to manageable quantities.
Although this looks a little suspicious, it’s what I did to 5# of hops.
It is a Food Saver and I’ve probably had it 6 years now with no issues. Haven’t used the hose feature but it has plenty of container/bag options to fit your needs. I planned on buying bulk meats and such and sealing them for future use but that doesn’t happen much. Instead, I buy hops in bulk and break them down like @WMNoob has pictured. That has “intent to deliver” charge written all over it 
I, too, have a FoodSaver, and I love it. It’s actually pretty slim and fits in a nice little nook in one of our cabinets.
Funny I’m in a similar situation. In fact this last Tuesday the misses said my hops take up 2 complete shelves in our upright freezer. And that doesn’t account for the hops in my bar fridge/freezer. I’m embarrassed to say how many pounds of hops I have.
That looks like the model we have only ours is white. It does have the tube for canning or whatever it does.
Avoid the small handheld FoodSaver Vacuum sealer. The vacuum sealer itself is fine, but the reusable (ziplock style) bags can’t hold the vacuum. After sealing about 20 bags of various items such as hops, coffee beans, food, etc. I’ve given up on it. All the bags started with a tight vacuum but only 2 of the bags still had a tight vacuum a few days later. The rest just looked like I did a good job of squeezing out most of the air from a regular zip-lock bag.
@barbarianbrewer oh that is really useful info. I was considering those bags and that hand model. Have you used the vacuum containers?
I’m sure my total poundage is pushing 20 as we speak. I’ve been using large amounts in my brews but then I will order 2-3 more pounds. I also get the “Hop Box” from YVH so that’s a pound every 3 months. Ill agree @loopie_beer, it’s kind of rediculous.
To stay on topic, I also tend to use the @dannyboy58 approach with cutting the bags longer initially and trimming back as I open and use some. Saves on material in the long run!
Years ago I bought a Reynolds Handi- Vac sealer. It came with special bags with a purge valve kind of port. Kind of a mini version of those space bags for garments. All the thing does is suck air out of the bags through the little port. I tried double bagging hops and two bags would not stay sealed.
They are only about $30 but a waste of money.
