New Product Reviews

If you’re like me, you remember when food sealers first came out. Big, cumbersome units that took up a considerable amount of counter space, used very large rolls of plastic, and cost a fortune. Unfortunately, those units are still available, though the costs is somewhat less and they are more readily available.

I saw a television commercial for the Handi-Vac and it looked like something I would have to have. It’s roughly the size of a hand-held can opener and isn’t very heavy. The zipper-type bags you must use with this product are made of a heavy plastic with a blue zipper type strip, plus a small air hole for the vacuum sealer. There are lines on the bag that tell you how far up you can fill the bag.

It comes with batteries already in place, but I wanted to see what type of batteries it used, so went to open the battery compartment. This was the part I disliked about the Handi-Vac. The battery compartment is not really easily accesible, you can’t just push a little button to open it up. You need an itsy bitsy teeny weenie Phillips-head screwdriver to open the compartment and retrieve/replace the batteries. Fortunately I keep that size tool around for my computer case but I don’t know if every household has that size screwdriver.

Using the Handi-Vac is simple. Put the food into the bag up to the measuring line, seal the zipper, then place the bag on the counter. Put the nozzle of the Handi-Vac right on the spot marked on the pag and push the button. What is supposed to happen, theoretically, is it will suck out all the air, leaving you a product that will stay fresher in the freezer without freezer burn.

It’s not that simple, though. You may have to move the unit up, down, to the left, to the right and wiggle it around until it makes the proper contact to suck out the air. Sometimes it can take 10 tries until you get it right. Once it begins to work it takes about 10-12 seconds to suck out all the air. If there is any liquid in the bag, it will be sucked into the nozzle area and you have to remove the plastic covering and wash off the covering and nozzle.

When it works, it works very, very well and is fairly easy to use. I froze several different types of foods in the quart-sized bags. I froze raw chicken, cooked chicken, raw hamburger meat and cooked pasta.

The chicken, both cooked and raw, remained sealed air-tight for weeks and weeks, as did the hamburger and pasta. Trying to use this on the grated cheese just to keep it fresh in the fridge was a disaster, as it stuck together in one clump. I also tried storing a loaf of artisan bread but as it began to suck out the air, the loaf of bread began to collapse, so I stopped right away.

I like how it’s compact and fits right into a kitchen drawer. While I don’t use it often, I’ve had to change batteries twice and once it begins to lose battery power you’ll know right away as it just does not work properly.

The price is right — around $10 for the unit depending on where you purchase it from. The bags can be expensive if you use them often. I paid $4.00 at my local supermarket for 20 quart-sized bags but when on sale at Target they were $2.00 and I stocked up.

I don’t reuse the bags but am told some people do put them in the dishwasher and reuse them. Since I don’t have a dishwasher and don’t relish attempting to clean out a bag used for raw chicken, I toss mine. The bags have a sort of mesh lining that will surely trap all the chicken bacteria unless it goes through a dishwasher.

The old fashioned type of vacuum sealers used rolls of plastic where you could cut a bag to size with a heat sealer and you’d often burn yourself, but you could freeze certain foods and then simply drop them in boiling water to cook the food.

This type is much easier to use, cheaper to buy and maintain, and easier to store. I wish it worked right away rather than having to move the unit around a bit, but I’d highly recommend it to anyone who needed an inexpensive vacuum sealer

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