PC Tuesday 06/08

I love my food saver and man freezer.

For those without a food saver, here's a way to suck out all the air from your ziplocks before freezing.   Slowly lower your ziplock bag of fish into a large bowl of water with the ziplock partially open and above the water line.  The pressure of the water will force all the air out of the bag (kind of like a vacuum in that the pressure in the bag will be less than the pressure outside of it).  Close the bag after all the air comes out and your set.

Brian

Ziploc also makes these sweet vacuum sealing bags that come with a vacuum pump. They really work great if you can find them. Problem is finding a store that keeps them in stock.

I heard of a trick to remove more oxygen from around your meat before sealing it, but I've never tried it.  

In a nut shell, ya put some dry ice in a container with holes (net, colonder, etc),
and have it supported inside, but off the bottom of a large cooler.  Place your filet's on a tray like a cookie cooling rack.  Allow the dry ice to melt off and the CO2 flows down into the cooler and surrounds the filets.  Your not trying to freeze it, but rather "displace" the natural air around the meat.  Have your bags rolled open and on the bottom of the cooler as well so they fill with CO2.  Once you have clouded over your filets (I have no idea what kind of time this may take), you can slip your filets into the bag, and then quickly get it to the food saver to evacuate the CO2, and seal it.

The idea behind the food saver is to remove the oxygen that oxidizes the food.  If you replace the oxygen with CO2 before using the food saver, you should effectively extend that "Fresh Caught" taste even longer.  

Again, I haven't tried this myself so I can't say if it works or not.  In theory it sounds like it would.

I think the pre-packaged beef you might buy at a grocery store meat counter that looks so bright red uses a similar technique.  The displace the normal air and it's O2 with a bunch of carbon dioxide, carbon monoxide and nitrogen.


I wonder if I could connect a hose to the bubbler on a batch of fermenting beer to fill my freezer bags with CO2?

Brian

I think the pre-packaged beef you might buy at a grocery store meat counter that looks so bright red uses a similar technique.  The displace the normal air and it's O2 with a bunch of carbon dioxide, carbon monoxide and nitrogen.


I wonder if I could connect a hose to the bubbler on a batch of fermenting beer to fill my freezer bags with CO2?

Brian

Now that's forward thinking!  Recycling your CO2. 

Now that's forward thinking!  Recycling your CO2.

I like to think of it as upcycling. 
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Upcycling

When I was a kid my dad taught me to fill the ziploc bag with water prior to freezing the meat.  But this was 20 years ago - Is vacuum sealing better?

Now that's forward thinking!  Recycling your CO2.

I like to think of it as upcycling. 
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Upcycling

You may be able to sell carbon credits via the new cap and trade markets

pre-packaged beef you might buy at a grocery store....

People still buy that stuff???

Actually, Beef is a little different in that the oxidization causes the red - much like your red blood cells in the presence of oxygen..


Anyways...

I subscribe to the "dip the bag in water" trick as the easiest method of removing air.  Sometimes I might follow up with a straw, but I've gotta be bagging up something good to get that retentive...

When I was a kid my dad taught me to fill the ziploc bag with water prior to freezing the meat.  But this was 20 years ago - Is vacuum sealing better?

Your dad's method is the technique I use to freeze whole fish.