Defective roll of foodsaver bags?

[dmg]

It is only one month since I acquired a Sous Vide Professional, and during this time I have been experimenting here and there. This includes cooking meat for 3 days (twice) and 2 days (once), and several experiments with vegetables and pears (cooking at around 90 C).

I have finished 3 rolls of bags without any problem, and milk at 90.5 C.

But yesterday I started a new one. The new roll (8", Foodsaver) has resulted in two bag failures out of 2 bags.

The failures have been in the sides of the bags, not in the seams I make (I usually seal them twice to make sure they will not leak).

The first case was 1 l. of milk at 90.5 for 40 minutes. As I was extracting the bag the seams gave up IN BOTH SIDES at the same

height.

Second time was 1 leg of duck at 82 degrees (after around 7 hrs). It opened in one side, as it was cooking (the smell of duck gave it away, fortunately it wasn't too much of a mess).

Has anybody else experience something like this? I might start double sealing the seams just to make sure...

--dmg

[slkinsey]

The short answer is that, yes, you should double-seal the bags.

Any time you have any liquid in the bag whatsoever, there is a chance some of it might get into the sealing area and make the seal less secure -- perhaps not immediately, but over time. One technique to counteract this is to seal the bag once leaving a fair bit of extra bag after the seal, then wipe out the extra bag well with a paper towel and seal the bag again in that area. The seals themselves should be clear, with no folds or anything like that.

Also... FoodSaver brand vacuum bags suck. Do yourself a favor and get some 50-foot rolls of bagging material from these guys. I think a FoodSaver should be able to use the 8" and 11" widths, but not the 15" width.

[Anna N]

....

Has anybody else experience something like this? I might start double sealing the seams just to make sure...

--dmg

Yes, it has happened to me but only on one occasion and it was the side-seam that failed not the seals I made. However, it was not a FoodSaver brand bag but one I bought in bulk from a restaurant supply store - there are no brand names on these bags. One could double seal the side seams but only on bags that don't exceed the length of seal bar on your machine and that is a pain!

[Paul Kierstead]

That definitely sounds like a defective roll. I ran a through quite a number of FS rolls and never had a single failure from a side seam..