To seal wet food you need to freeze it in a container before.

I just opened mine. Glad for this video! I was doing it wrong. Thank you for showing that I can use other brand bags.

Thank you, I was not doing it right! Very good info.

Thank you for doing this video! I am 56 years old and remember when my mom had bought one of these when I was a kid. They absolutely have been around a long time and I’m glad to see that they are still here. I’m super glad to see you do a vacuum seal on the bread. I have been going out of my brain trying to figure out how can I keep some bread in the house without it going bad. My children are grown and no longer living with me so it’s difficult to shop and not waste food. I am inspired… Thanks again!🙌 Oh yeah… Maybe you could try putting the soup in some sort of bowl and sealing it that way. I’m looking at someone else’s thumbnail where there is soup in a bowl and it looks like it’s sealed really well👍

Bought mine a couple of months ago at Walmart. Finally opened it and tried to SEAL 2 different packages. It will NOT suck the air out! Ok, I am editing this comment. After re-watching this video, I realized it was a USER error...I was NOT putting the bag inside the drip tray. Works pretty good on ground chuck. Thanks for a very thorough video!!

Thank you so much. You answered all my questions about this but no directions thanks again

I bought this a couple days ago and cannot get it to vaccum. It sealed fine. Going to try again today. Thx for the helpful video!

Hello, by now you are now probably an expert at vacuum sealing making my comment unnecessary. First off, it is great that you did some preliminary testing, that is the best way to figure out the pros and cons of a channel vacuum sealer. I have an old Food Saver that I bought at Sam's Club years ago. It still works, but that is because I really only use it to repack meat, fish, and cheese. At most I"m using it every two weeks or so. Liquids don't work well in channel vacuum sealers. If you really need to vacuum pack them you can freeze them first, or (like you did) use a big bag and less liquid. Even if you don't completely remove all of the air your chicken will still last much longer when sealed, so don't worry too much unless you are planning on keeping it frozen for years. Just rotate out the chicken (first in/first out). I always use generic bags, they work well and are significantly less expensive. People always say that the rolls are cheaper, but I think they are roughly the same cost per foot as the bags. However, they may be less expensive overall since you can customize their size. For instance, a quart-sized bag is 8 x 12. Maybe you only need an 8 x 10 bag so over time a roll might save you a little money. However, I always buy the ready-made generic bags, they make my life just a tiny bit easier.

Thank you for this video, it definitely was very helpful, esp. with the roll bags, i couldn't figure that out for nothing lol. I find that the smaller the customized bag is the less air has to be removed and you'll get that tighter fit like the bread, I haven't tried chicken, however, I did try cake i didn't want it so compacted, so I used a larger bag, the cake wasn't going to last that long any way lol and it worked for me, once again Thank You.

I’ve got the VP215 Absolutely never going back. But you get what you pay for. The bags used for it, will save you enough to pay for the VP215 Great show my friend Thank you

You really have to make sure the part of the bag that seals is dry. Chicken breasts are really juicy. If I get the sealing part of the bag wet I will take paper towels and wipe the inside surface. You can try folding the top part of the bag over on itself before you put the chicken in the bag. Once the chicken is in the bag unfold it and vacumm it. This helps keep the sealing surface dry.

Excellent review. Thanks. I had a seal a meal 30yrs ago. It was perfect, just like the one you reviewed. My sister has some expensive model (Not Seal a Meal) and it sucks. Waaaaay to complicated.

The instructions say wet stuff let it partially freeze before you seal.

Let me give you a hint when you're putting your chicken breast in your bags don't put it all the way down in the bottom you need to keep your chicken breast right about the middle of your bag and just cut enough of your bag off for 1 chicken breast at a time and don't have a lot of excess bag. that is a lot of the problem with it not being able to suck all the air out. I think I would give this a try and see if it's any better I'm thinking you will see the difference just thought I would share.

It's always going to be difficult trying to seal a liquid like soup. What you can do is fols a couple paper towels and put in the bag below the area that will be sealed. That way the liquid gets absorbed by the paper towels.

I mainly want to seal dry goods like rice, beans, pasta 🍝 oatmeal, cake 🍰 & pancake mixes. I will definitely be using gallon bags & no pint sizes. Is Seal-A-Meal good for dry goods?

When storing liquids....I place the liquid in a REGULAR PLASTIC BAG, such the ones you get from the grocery store (the small plastic bags for produce... ie) and I fold the bag over the liquid facing the bottom of the SEALING BAG... that way the liquid will not be sucked into the vacuum chamber.... I have good rate of success with that... THNX

I don't have a Seal a Meal, but it looks like you release the pressure on the device either before the red light is on when it comes on, so maybe you need to keep the pressure with your hands on the lid?

Thanks for your video. I just got one too and am learning how to use it. I've seen other videos where people freeze liquid items before sealing. You did give me an idea for storing sugar. I am going to split up my bag, put the sugar in a brown paper bags and just seal the top of the storage bag rather than vacuum seal. Cheaper than mylar!

excellent review i love it after watching the guy video beneath your video i decided to watch your video because he did not use his like the instructions said to... again thank you im headed to Walmart

Thanks how do use it if you want custom made or size plastic

Cant blame it for the chicken tho, it was cornered and the squares where blocked off by the fluids. Those squares are so it can get the air out. Also, it does say in the manual of such machines that you should wipe dry your food if possible :p even tho I wouldn't do that.

I did the chicken tenders

good review easy to understand and helped make me understand how to use machine better. thanks

When you do the liquid your freezer first you don’t want it frozen then you seal it it works easier that way go to one it’s what it does not seal

mine still never sucks the air despite me using it completely correctly and putting the top in the drip tray:(

Probably too much liquid, don’t want to ruin machine. And I think the top of the bag needs to be dry. May have had soup on it from when you filled the bag. Happy sealing!

The chicken noodle soup! While soup shouldn't be vacuum sealed due to the machine possibly sucking in liquid... I'm surprised that it wouldn't make a seal at all until the 3rd time. Good review, tho.

What about dry and moist modes? It's supposed to have those settings.

Just bought one of these. Thanks for demo

When using the roll, after you make the seal, do you put the other end in the drip try like you were doing?

A lady helped me with her seal a meal and she said bring meat about inch from bottom of bag

Bought two both have stopped sealing won’t even seal the end of the bag. Didn’t even have either three months each at most.

Thank you for such a good review

Freeze the bag of soup before trying to vacuum seal it.

My friend has one and she says to freeze meat before you seal.

Whoa. That's really great.

1:05 Don’t know if you’re right about the #FoodSaver having canning/tinning capabilities. I had two of the $179 food saver machines don’t ask me why. As well, my mum has the food saver but she has the high high high high-end one so that thing is so convoluted frankly is a nightmare she’s had it for like probably a year and a half two years and she still doesn’t know how the hell to use it. I couldn’t even figure out how to use it and I have the lower and model it Lauren $179 plus tax for a basically a glorified heat ceiling thing that sucks arrows of bags please! AnyWho, yeah she has the one that’s like $400 or something like that and it’s so difficult to use even I couldn’t get to work and keep in mind we’re not idiots. She worked for the government for 35+ years and I’m sure I can federal government, she worked on Y2K. Oh yeah, she was working on IT putting it mildly; I’m talking boat, working management board, secretariat for the federal and then later on provincial government doing programming , etc. So trust me when I tell you she’s no dummy. Myself personally, I am into inventing things building things taught myself Linux mind you you never stop learning Linux so say I will always say I’m still in the process Learning Linux. As well a building and I am working on finding my first patent, so I’m not talking about a couple dummies who can’t figure out how to screw in a lightbulb or plug in a microwave. That’s how over-the-top convoluted unnecessarily so the top-of-the-line food saver is. So yeah, take this don’t buy the top line food saver. You don’t need it it’s not and you won’t be able to use it even if you do need it, so that was the point I need something that intense by another brand let’s see this one and thanks for the video brother appreciate

I think with the chicken, it might have been better to put it in the center of the bag instead of at the bottom. Maybe get more air out that way.

Just got one and having so much trouble getting mine to even vacuum anything out 😡

higher end models seal better... this is the lowest end model... does the job... but the bigger models seal anything easy

Need to freeze before sealing chicken or meat’s

You won’t see me but I’ll see you. Lol. I bought one on your review

you need to give it a chance to cool down read instructions

Thought it was by rival

Why won’t mine work

Mine's a POS. It might work once every ten tries. A waste of money. The custom make bags are a nightmare. Trying to seal one side before puttinng food in? You had better have a TON of patience. It definitely doesn't work like this demo...at least mine doesn't. I gave up on the piece of junk...

All Stores Please Lower the price of all Military and Local for all Brands of Seal -a -Meal Products and Accessories and Production Cost Now That's too much $$ The Whole World Now 🙏🙏🙏

You should probably lay the meat flat before vacuuming.

Piece of junk. Mine stopped working after about 10 uses. Never did work well with the air suctioning.

This vacuum is sh.. not working at all

This thing is a peice of junk. Does not work at all

These stink