I love soup and this looks soooo good!
Very cold and snow less winter here, soups are a welcome meal on these cold days.
What did I cook this weekend.....
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Very cold and snow less winter here, soups are a welcome meal on these cold days.
This is not an actual cooking post, it's a cooking equipment post. My 4th FoodSaver has died, and I'm using my brewery FoodSaver which also has issues-the automatic seal capability quit on all 4 of mine within 2 years of purchase. And FoodSaver units are glacial. In France we use a $30 unit that sucks and seals in 1/4 the time my FoodSaver takes to suck but not seal. Does anyone here use a different brand that they actually like and recommend?
I had a FoodSaver that I gave to our son when I bought an Inkbird. That Inkbird stopped working correctly after a couple months, but after contacting them they gave me an Amazon code to get a free replacement. So far the replacement is working ok, and I do like the built in bag cutter, but I think one would have to spend quite a bit more money to get something closer to an "industrial" version.
I use a food saver but it’s a pretty basic model. I always give it a good wipe down after each use. It has its occasional hiccup but is pretty reliable over all.
For the last few years I’ve been looking for an excuse to purchase a chamber sealer. Especially since the prices have dropped a bit.
For the last few years I’ve been looking for an excuse to purchase a chamber sealer. Especially since the prices have dropped a bit.
Coming from central coastal CA, we are very used to "CalMex" and we haven't found many restaurants here (northern Colorado River area of AZ) that prepare foods to our liking. BUT there are a couple of recent discoveries that are decent. One of them, DH ordered his favorite dish, chile verde, and the sauce was SO spicy he could barely eat it! He does like their Chiles Rellenos though, they use very little batter which he prefers.
The machaca I was first introduced to as a kid my Dad brought back frozen from AZ to CA (in the nose cone of his buddy's twin-engine Cessna!) and it was made of pork. The first machaca I introduced my husband to was in Napa, CA and it was also made from pork. So we tend to like that way best. Easy enough to make with the leftover carnitas!
Now I'm hungry for Mexican again - and we just had it two nights ago, LOL! I have a bit of a viral respiratory thing going on and I always crave spicy Mexican food when I have that sort of illness. Clears the sinuses out admirably!
If you aren't opposed to spending a chunk of change on one, we have a chamber sealer we really love. It's an Avid Armor and this is the one:
Avid Armor Chamber Vacuum Sealer Guide Series GS53 Oil Pump Machine
We got it directly from Avid Armor last summer and it was about 1400. It does a lot more stuff, and better, than our FoodSavers although we still have two of those also - one for our fermented foods and one for everything else that we don't/can't do in the chamber vac.
It's a big heavy beast so we also bought a kitchen cart for it to live on which is nice because it can be rolled up to whatever surface you want to use for your vacuuming stuff.
Sounds great, but. I'm retired and no longer get to spend $1400 just because, and I don't have room in the kitchen for a gadget on a rolling cart. I need a fairly basic unit to seal up leftover lasagne, posole, and pulled pork and that can be stuck on the pantry shelf after use. I still CAN use one of my current FoodSavers, but when I manually hit the seal button I can see the bag losing vacuum(just a little), and I have to double seal both ends or I end up with a food filled balloon in the freezer.
Oldskewl
Well-Known Member
What brand bags are you using? I bought some off brand bags on amazon and I struggle to get a good seal, especially if the food has above average moisture. I've seen a few people reccommend outofair bags. I plan to try them this year. https://outofair.com/
Yeah they are expensive. In my situation I’m gonna try to justify this way;
The cost of a LEM is sub $500 now
-eventually my foodsaver will go out..that’s $120ish
-the bags for chamber sealers are significantly less.
-I’ll be able to seal more foods, including sauces, soups and marinades.
In my case, I’d be losing money by not purchasing. At least this is what I’d tell my wife.
90% of the time I use Foodsaver bags, I think I have some off brand bags somewhere. I'll give the OutofAir bags a shot.
Thanks, but honestly we don't vacuum seal enough items to justify the cost. Plus, we can't set aside the space required even if we wanted it.
Those chamber vacs are not for everyone, for sure. The older one we had, we kept in the laundry room until I reconfigured stuff to get that rolling cart. Like AzOr, we DO use ours a lot - and DH seals many shelf-stable items in canning jars. For example, we take our coffee beans and vacuum-seal them in pint jars, which is just enough to fill the hopper on the grinder. He can fill all 12 pint jars and put them all at once into the chamber vac, where he used to spend quite a bit of time individually sealing them with the FoodSaver jar adapter. Worked fine but this is much simpler and time-saving. Plus it will accept much larger bags than the FoodSaver can seal so it's easy to seal up and freeze those big chuck roasts and such. AND I love being able to seal soups and other liquidy items without having to freeze them first. To each his/her own but we love ours.
We've probably bought 6 or 7 Foodsavers over the years and if you figure $100/each, more or less, it does help justify the cost of the "big dog" somewhat. I buy my bags right from Avid Armor when they are having a good sale, which they do several times a year.
We've probably bought 6 or 7 Foodsavers over the years and if you figure $100/each, more or less, it does help justify the cost of the "big dog" somewhat. I buy my bags right from Avid Armor when they are having a good sale, which they do several times a year.
I think Costco introduced their own bags.
If Costco is an option for you.
3 hours away.
It's been nice here the past couple days, low/mid 70's so I decided to fire up the grill today. Boneless chicken thighs, with a very tastefully understated cilantro/lime marinade. Served with a side of smashed baby red potatoes with sour cream, and steamed brussels sprouts seasoned with butter, salt, and pepper.
I have one from Inkbird, it’s been working fine, I don’t use it a lot it was reasonably priced, they have models with varying features.
Quick and easy soup and salad tonight.
The protein in the middle is some heat and eat beef brisket not bad, but not nearly as good as home cooked.
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Looks heavenly to me, 3 of my favorite foods. Our temp got above 30F and we had sunshine. Tomorrow will be a grill day for sure.
We have the Inkbird VS05 and like it. Gives you the ability to adjust the vacuum from full to soft so you can do meats and veggies to soft breads. Can use generic rolls and cut bags to the size you need. Not too expensive. I'd recommend it.
https://inkbird.com/products/vacuum-sealer-ink-vs05
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Mediterranean pizza. Thin crust. Harissa, red pepper pesto and Greek yogurt sauce; kalamata, artichoke, baby spinach, feta, mozz, leftover leg of lamb, anything else Mediterranean you like. Delicious.
I just want to come spend a week in the @Hoppy2bmerry house. I imagine the company is wonderful but know the meals are second to none. You up for company?!?
That’s a very nice compliment.
I would like to invite myself along to that trip!
Merry, so glad you contribute regularly to this thread and always with lovely photos. I still can't seem to train myself to take a picture at least of the plated food. Once it's on the plate, it's on the table and in my face with no stops in between! LOL! And thanks too, to everyone else who takes the time to post and particularly all the lovely photos. Very much appreciated.
I cooked a small spiral sliced ham last night (still unimpressed with spiral sliced, I prefer a chunk of meat to cut to my liking!) but it has a nice bone which is going into the Instant Pot shortly. Resulting ham stock will be used for ham and yelloweye bean soup for dinner.
Homemade sausage, salami and onion pizza. My timing was off making the dough, so we had a small salad and a cup of vegetable beef soup while waiting for the dough to prove.
My wife hates American bread, so I taught her my white bread recipe, and now we buy almost no bread. The other day, she needed flour, and we saw White Lily bread flour at the store. It was new to me, so we tried it. The bread was excellent. Significantly better than the results we got with Gordon Food Service Primo Gusto and King Arthur Bread Flour. King Arthur is somewhat overrated.
Anyway, I decided to make a pizza yesterday. Very nice. The dough was very silky and soft. It required lower hydration than the other flours. The crust was somewhat more delicate. The pizza blew up nicely. I like a bubbly rim, and this flour did not disappoint.
Anyway, I decided to make a pizza yesterday. Very nice. The dough was very silky and soft. It required lower hydration than the other flours. The crust was somewhat more delicate. The pizza blew up nicely. I like a bubbly rim, and this flour did not disappoint.
Tonight we made a roast pork tenderloin with apple sauce, steamed golden beets, fried potatoes and a Ceasar salad. A medallion theme for no appearant reason.
I remember this flour and cornmeal in my Mississippi grandmother's kitchen when I was just a kid (a long time ago). Haven't thought about that in years. She made some darn tasty baked goods with it.
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When you mention it to Northerners, they have no idea what it is.
Red beans and rice (it's Monday!), oven fried okra, smoked sausage and skillet cornbread. Oh, and Beano.
Hoe cakes! Great with chili.
Well, it's not the weekend, and I didn't cook anything, but I'm not going to start a thread on "Big Salads", so I'm dropping this here 
Salad for lunch allows for an extra beer after dinner!
Cheers!
Salad for lunch allows for an extra beer after dinner!
Cheers!
Looks good, too. I love a good chopped salad!
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I didn't get a pic (I will moving forward) but I marinated some chicken breast in Italian dressing, then did a pecan coating. Paired that with roasted sweet potatoes with a ton of stuff on them that basically makes them a dessert (brown sugar, marshmallows...and butterscotch chips).
It was excellent. Used the chicken on some lavash with prosciutto and Japanese mayo and dill Havarti the next day for lunch. Also excellent.
It was excellent. Used the chicken on some lavash with prosciutto and Japanese mayo and dill Havarti the next day for lunch. Also excellent.
Beef and cheese quesadilla with chips and the usual accompaniments.
We had chicken salad for dinner. I grilled boneless thighs, and my wife made a salad with lettuce, carrots, cukes, beets, cauliflower, broccoli, bell peppers, green onions and parmesan. She also made the vinaigrette dressing. Dessert is a spiced dates cake.
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Leftover moose that got minced and put in the freezer after NYE became pasta sauce tonight.
Washed down with HB brown ale.
Washed down with HB brown ale.
The last slice of Christmas rib roast with potato leek soup and salad.
TwistedGray
El Jefe Brewing Company
Made the wife a coconut tres leches cake for her birthday.
My entry for the Chopped Salad Olympics: iceberg lettuce, green and red onion, celery, carrots, baby portabellas, tuna, hard boiled egg, sharp cheddar, bacon, pecans, pickled jalapenos, homemade Italian dressing, and grated parmesan...
Cheers!
Cheers!
