Foodsaver Vacuum Bags?

[Roberta]

I know some of you guys like to use a vacuum food saver for your fish filets. I have run out of the 8" roll of bag material for my Tilia brand Foodsaver and am appalled at the price I found in one catalog. ($23.00 + shipping for 20' roll)
Are there any retail outlets you know of that sell the bag material at a price that's comparable to freezer bags?

Thanks. - Roberta

[dontcatchmany]

Roberta,

I have the Foodsaver. I too am not too happy with the prices on the rolls.

I have found it a little cheaper to go to Wally World and get the Black and Decker Rolls. They work just as well as the Foodsaver Brand of bags.

The two roll box of Black and Decker is about $2.00 a roll cheaper than the Foodsaver brand. Shhhhhhh don't tell anybody or B& D will raise their prices.

Also, I love the Foodsaver. I have a Professional II and probably paid too much for it. But it definitely keeps fish much better and for longer than zip lock bags. I have had fish keep for up to two years and they taste almost as fresh as the day they were caught.

I do have several problems with the Tilia Foodsaver as far as construction:
1. The hinges are plastic and have broken...still works, just a pita
2. The black foam looking liner is a pita to keep in the thing.
3. The handler for the slicer is plastic and broken.
4. I wish it had a shutoff button that would cause the thing to stop as soon as it is pushed.

I like it, but for the money, I would think that its construction would be a little better. I also wish that Tilia was not gouge pricing the bag rolls.

I wish I could find a commercial type of food vacuum that did not cost an arm and a leg.

[Roberta]

I was hoping prices were better than that at W-M.
This thing was given to us years ago and I seriously doubt I would buy one considering the price. I'll bet they'd sell more of them if they were cheaper. I agree that the quality should be higher to correspond with the price tag.

I like the large bags for freezing whole fish, but still put my filets in water in regular freezer bags. I mostly use the 8" size for the large amount of garden produce I put up every year. I guess Glad will be selling more freezer bags to us.

- Roberta

[ID_Paul]

If you have a CostCo near you, try there. If I remember right, a pack of 2 8" rolls and 4 11" rolls is about $45.

Paul

[frank lawhead]

If you have a CostCo near you, try there. If I remember right, a pack of 2 8" rolls and 4 11" rolls is about $45.

Paul

for the last every many years I,ve put my crappie fillets in a 1/2 gal milk or juice carton ---top it off with water and it keeps them fresh forever
whiplash :

[Big Zig]

How fresh are these fillets that are over a year old? I had a few pounds of Northern Pike fillets that I forgot about. When I came across them it was about 15 months from the date on the bag. Tasted terrible, and that was frozen in water.

[Tim The Lippa Rippa Mon]

8" roll of Tilia brand bags- price in one catalog. ($23.00 + shipping for 20' roll)

If you type in food saver bags on Ebay, they are going the 8 & 11" bag rolls are going for an average around $8-11 per roll + S&H. FYI.

<,"}/>{ Rippa

[labill]

I know some of you guys like to use a vacuum food saver for your fish filets. I have run out of the 8" roll of bag material for my Tilia brand Foodsaver and am appalled at the price I found in one catalog. ($23.00 + shipping for 20' roll)
Are there any retail outlets you know of that sell the bag material at a price that's comparable to freezer bags?

Thanks. - Roberta

I use the Tilia also. Did you know that you can reuse your bags if you only stored vegetables in them? You can. When I discovered how expensive they were I did exactly that. You can turn them inside out (warm them in tap water first) and wash them in antibacterial dish soap, rinse and allow to dry. Tilia doesn't recommend reuse after storing meat, mostly as a disclaimer in the event customers do not properly clean the bags. If you have doubts, don't reuse the meat bags. You can save considerably by just reusing the veggie bags.

I've never seen any vacuum bags sold at a freezer bag price, but WalMart or Sam's has good prices if you can buy in bulk. I haven't tried EBay and don't have a Costco here.

[Moose1am]

While listening to the best of Simon & Garfield I am reminded by this post of the word "Plastic" as used in the movie "THE GRADUATE". Anyone in here remember when that movie came out?

I have grown to hate the word and the items made out of Plastic. Now rubbermaid is great but most other forms of hard plastic are useless.

Everything I have that is made out of plastic has some part of the plastic which is broken. My run cleaner had broken where the screw that holds the receptical for the cleaner bottles is broken. Now the screw won't stay in and I can't put a cleaning bottle in the machine. It's shot and can't be used anymore. The company Eurecka went out of business. I managed to snag a few new plastic parts before they went down and out. That is the only way I have been able to keep the run clearner going for these few last year.

Parts on my truck have screws falling out since they are screwed into plastic that breaks. Never make something out of plastic that is held together with metal screws. It just won't work and last. It's built in obsolescene. They make parts out of plastic because it's not only cheaper but they know it will break sooner and that you will have to return to buy another item from them.

Well we get what we pay for and we are all deep into things made out of plastic.

I remember when my X bought a metal vacume and run cleaner for over $500.00 but now I remember that it was all metal. They just hardly ever make anything out of sheet metal these days anymore. I long for the old days when if the item didn't get wet and rust it would last a lifetime

My lawnmowers top has two metal screws that screws into the plastic gas tank below. Those screws stripped out and I had to replace the gas tank below. I also had to replace the metal part under the gas tank since it's screw holes had been damages too. That part held the starter rope. After finally ordering all the parts I ended up having to take the mower in for repairs after something inside (A governor of some kind) broke. It was most likey made out of plastic also.

My lid latch on my Plano tackle box has broke. It's made out of plastic too.

The holder on my Humminbird LCR 8000 depth finder broke also. It allowed the unit to swivel 360 degs but it's broke too.

My Question is this. When they know that plastic will break why don't we get congress to require them to supply us with spare parts that are known to break often. I worked in a plastic factory one summer for two weeks before I got on with a Union Sheet Metal Shop that paid more money. I saw how they manufactured plastic parts for refrigerators and the like. It's mass production. Why not require the plastic manufactures to make a few extra parts and have them available to use for replacement parts.

Looking around the house I could name about 25 more items that are made out of plastic that have broken in the past few years.


Hope you find some rolls of plastic that work and are not too costly. But with oil prices rising it's going to raise the cost of making plastic as hydrocarbons are required to manufacture plastic.

Wish I had some crappie filets to eat. I caught 10 small crappie Saturday. Four of the ten were not doing so well when I brought them home and put them in my 48 quart cooler which I filled with clean water. The four that were dying I pulled out of the cooler and dumped them inside a bucket and put in two bags of crushed ice. I was going to go fishing Sunday and catch a few more and then clean them all at the same time. I still have 5 live crappie in the Cooler but the ones that I iced down were found this morning with only water in the bucket and the sun had done it's job on the crappie flesh. Not fit to eat they will become fertilizer for my garden.

I talked to the DNR guys and it was made known to me that they wanted to take a few of the smaller crappie out of the lake to give those crappie that were left more of the resources. This should help those crappie that are left to grow much larger. So the theory goes. Also I saw the Raghorn New Program on TV Saturday morning and they were fishing up at Lake Monroe in IN. They were only catching 7" and 8" long crappies and were talking about how good they were to eat. It's too bad that Indiana Crappie fisherman don't have the big slabs that other states down south have. KY and TN have 10" size limits at Kentucky Lake were IN does not have that in our major lakes. Maybe that is why we have so many small crappie and so few large crappies? Patoka is getting bigger and bigger crappie though.

Well I again hope you find your plastic bags for your vacume freezer machine. Hope that they can provide you with some spare parts to fix the thing too.

Roberta,

I have the Foodsaver. I too am not too happy with the prices on the rolls.

I have found it a little cheaper to go to Wally World and get the Black and Decker Rolls. They work just as well as the Foodsaver Brand of bags.

The two roll box of Black and Decker is about $2.00 a roll cheaper than the Foodsaver brand. Shhhhhhh don't tell anybody or B& D will raise their prices.

Also, I love the Foodsaver. I have a Professional II and probably paid too much for it. But it definitely keeps fish much better and for longer than zip lock bags. I have had fish keep for up to two years and they taste almost as fresh as the day they were caught.

I do have several problems with the Tilia Foodsaver as far as construction:
1. The hinges are plastic and have broken...still works, just a pita
2. The black foam looking liner is a pita to keep in the thing.
3. The handler for the slicer is plastic and broken.
4. I wish it had a shutoff button that would cause the thing to stop as soon as it is pushed.

I like it, but for the money, I would think that its construction would be a little better. I also wish that Tilia was not gouge pricing the bag rolls.

I wish I could find a commercial type of food vacuum that did not cost an arm and a leg.

[Moose1am]

Just make sure that you wash them out good and dry them. I have been doing this for a while now.

I do this mostly to help prevent the landfills from filling up to fast.

Now I don't do this with meat that much. Just sandwitches and stuff like vegs.



[QUOTE=labill]I use the Tilia also. Did you know that you can reuse your bags if you only stored vegetables in them? You can. When I discovered how ex]