How a Vacuum Sealer Helps You Eat Healthier and Save Money

If you’ve never seen one, a vacuum sealer is a relatively small countertop tool—roughly the length and width of a loaf of bread—that sucks out the excess air from specialized food storage baggies, then quickly seals the bag before it can fill up with ambient air. The idea: Removing the air, and more specifically oxygen, extends the life of whatever you’re preserving. It can also help eliminate freezer burn because there’s less air exchange. (Food manufacturers use vacuum sealing to extend the shelf life of food at the supermarket, most often on items like bacon or deli meat.) 

Now, this might not be for everybody, but a vacuum sealer is a natural fit for me. I am, by my own admission, a bit obsessed with minimizing food waste. I believe that just about any scraps can be turned into “fun” future toppings for pizza or salad. I’ve never met a stale piece of bread I couldn’t turn into a crouton.

And as a result, my fridge and freezer are both packed with countless small baggies, each filled with food at various stages of the constant freeze-and-thaw cycle that fuels this obsession. My trusted accomplice in this mission is, of course, my vacuum sealer—the Sundance Kid to my Butch Cassidy, in my endless war on food waste. It’s an appliance I use so much that my 9-year-old son once asked me, earnestly, if there was any food I wouldn’t vacuum seal for the future. Probably not.

But waste worries aside, my vacuum sealer also earns the distinction of being my favorite tool for healthy meal prep. Here’s how.