Debbie Meyer Green Bags
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List Price: Our Price: $5.00 You Save: $4.99 (50%) Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days Buy Used: from $2.75 (click here) Category: Kitchen See more product details |
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Kitchen and Housewares Reviews of Debbie Meyer Green Bags
Customer Review: Useful in limited cases.
Summary: 3 Stars
These bags can help with preserving fruits and vegetables, but first you need to understand the process of what is going on, and understand the MULTIPLE factors affecting your fruits and vegetables; read on to get this basic understanding.
Practice a small amount of planning with your produce, and make sure you are storing your fruits and veges properly, and you can eat healthy, delicious, and fresh produce all week long, even with a single trip to the store!
First of all, don't let your produce get warm. Shop for produce last, and go directly home with it. The warmer it gets, the faster it respires (breathes), the faster it ripens, and the sooner it eventually rots.
You can also choose less ripe fruit, which will mean it lasts longer at home. Of course if you're going to eat it soon, look for the ripest produce. You can often buy very ripe fruits and vegetables at a discount from your grocer, which can save you money if you plan to eat them or cook them immediately. Look at the back of the produce section or ask. Farmers at the farmer's market will also be able to advise you which produce is ready to eat, and which needs a little more time.
These fruits and vegetables will last a week or less:
Artichokes
Asparagus
Avocados
Bananas
Basil
Broccoli
Cherries
Corn
Dill
Green beans
Mushrooms
Mustard greens
Strawberries
Watercress
These will last about a week:
Arugula
Cucumbers
Eggplant
Grapes
Lettuce
Lime
Mesclun
Pineapple
Zucchini
These will last up to a couple weeks if stored properly:
Apricots
Bell peppers
Blueberries
Brussels sprouts
Cauliflower
Grapefruit
Leeks
Lemons
Oranges
Oregano
Peaches
Pears
Plums
Spinach
Tomatoes
Watermelon
These will last for several months, but are best within about one month:
Apples
Beets
Cabbage
Carrots
Celery
Garlic
Onions
Potatoes
Winter squash
The fresher your produce is when you buy will mean it lasts longer at home as well. That's why a farmer's market or CSA is a great bet for making your produce last - it is picked fresh the day you buy it, versus produce in the store which may have been picked green before traveling by truck or ship for days or weeks before you ever set eyes upon it.
You can also use special discs or produce bags that absorb ethylene, the ripening gas. This can stop produce from ripening so quickly because when fruits and vegetables detect ethylene they begin to produce more of it. Of course ethylene can also be used to help produce ripen when you are eager to eat it. The old banana in a bag trick works because ripe bananas produce a lot of ethylene and will trigger whatever is in the bag with them to ripen and begin producing their own ethylene.
Some high ethylene producing fruits should be refrigerated, whiles others shouldn't. Refrigerate these: Apples, Cantaloupe, Figs, and Honeydew. Don't refrigerate these: Avocados, Bananas, Nectarines, Peaches, Tomatoes, and Bell Peppers. High ethylene-producing fruits will be most extended by the "green bags," but only the ones that can be refrigerated!
And some produce doesn't make much ethylene but is very sensitive to it. Keep these away from the gas producers above: Bananas (also need to stay at room temperature), Broccoli, Brussels sprouts, Cabbage, Carrots, Cauliflower, Cucumbers, Eggplant, Lettuce and other leafy greens, Parsley, Peas, Peppers (best at room temperature), Squash, Sweet potatoes (best at room temperature in winter only), Watermelon.
Customer Review: the wave of the future
Summary: 5 Stars
Recently I purchased these bags from Amazon because it was cheaper than paying the shipping and I wanted to bump up my order to twenty-five. I have seen Debbie Meyer (doesn't she have such a nice and comforting voice, too?) on HSN for the past couple of years and found her presentations very informational and interesting. I was somewhat skeptical, though. However lately I have been throwing away so much vegetables and herbs (there is nothing I hate more than wasting food). And some things just cannot be frozen. Speaking of the freezer, keep your microwave popcorn in the freezer so that it stays fresher and nearly all kernels will pop; just a little added tip! Anyway I have been using these bags for the past week now and they work great. Everything stays fresh and it's surprising to see how much they actually hold (I got an entire large back of potatoes in one of the large bags). There are a few rules to remember: make sure everything is bone dry before you put it in the bags, do not put 2 different types of items in the same bag together, check the bags to be sure no moisture builds up and enjoy! I have all of my vegetables, fruits and herbs in my green bags. I even had several bags left over (this comes with 10 large and 10 small green bags) so I gave some to my parents because they have a large garden so this would be perfect for them. Today I made fresh salsa with red onions and tomatoes that were put in the bags and everything tasted and looked wonderfully fresh. Another thing I like about the bags is that it makes the fridge and storage areas look nice and is very organized. Like Debbie says, this is "active storage." Instead of using those cheap supermarket clear bags (that always rip) these bags can be used to organize everything and they are thicker (almost like heavy duty plastic). If you have lots of herbs like me you may want to label the bags, that's what I have done. Thanks Debbie, no more cash in the trash! P.S. I will update this if I find that the bags do not work in the future as advertised or have any issues or new information to add.
Update:
* The bags works very well with fresh herbs, broccoli, green beans and brussell sprouts
* The bags work very poorly with potatoes, they actually help speed up the rotting process
* Bags can be used like saran wrap for vegetables that are cut or pealed
* Excess moisture seems to build up in the bags, compared to traditional ways to store vegetables
Customer Review: Tested, followed instructions, very satisfied
Summary: 4 Stars
I was very skeptical about the claims I saw on TV and on the package. I felt that it was worth the $9.95 to try it out as I was troubled about the amount of fruits and vegetables that we would often throw out. I decided to perform a test, starting with bananas.
1) I placed one set of three bananas in the green bag; I kept one set of two in the store bags and another set of three out.
2) I followed the instructions that the bags should not be completely sealed so that moisture can escape.
3) I checked on a daily basis and took one of the bananas from each set every other day.
4) By day three it was obvious that the green bag was doing its job very well, I did not use the last banana that was in the green bag and the last one that was outside to really test this.
5) On day five, I used the last banana that was left outside in a Piña colada as it was unappealing to look at and I did not want to lose it. Its color was getting bad
6) On day seven, I ate the last banana in the green bag and enjoyed its appearance, texture and taste. I was honestly impressed as I was pretty certain that I was going to lose the $9.95.
I discovered that when my wife accidentally sealed up a bag, the contents started to spoil as there was no way for the moisture to escape. I had not informed her as to the correct method for these green bags as I was hiding the fact that I had spent almost $10.00 for those plastic bags! I was certain that she would have screamed. When she checked out my banana experiment (it was on day five), she was very surprised and now uses the green bags regularly. She found it difficult to NOT seal the bags, as that is what she has always done. But she is getting better at remembering, as she is really sold on these bags. We do wish that there were larger size green bags to purchase as some items (cabbage heads, etc.) do not fit in the sizes now available and we do notice the difference between those that we "green bag" and those that go into our old store provided bags.
Customer Review: Great for bananas. How to easily cover holes when a bag tears.
Summary: 4 Stars
This 4-star rating is based entirely on my success in storing bananas at room temperature, and not on results with other refiger. or non-refiger. foods. The G. Bags work great to slow down the ripening of bananas . I estimate that they make a banana taste OK for at least 3 more days than usual, maybe even for 6 or 7 more days, depending on how firm and sweet, etc., you want them to be.
Apples kept in the fridge in Green Bags seem to stay good longer than in plain, clear bags. How MUCH longer, I can't judge.
The main disadvantages for us:
-The sharp ends of the banana stems occasionally tear a hole in a bag. But I can quickly patch the hole with a piece of "package sealing tape", or "Scotch" tape.
-The green color of the bag makes it a bit harder (compared to an uncolored, clear bag) to see how green or yellow/ripe the bananas are, without opening the bag to look inside. As a result, my super-busy wife seems to eat fewer bananas than before. So I have taken to trying to remember to always leave 1 or 2 bananas outside a bag, so she will quickly see & grab one.
-Do the bags help greatly with other veg.'s & fruits? (WARNING: LONG, run-on sentence follows!) For stuff we refrigerate, I'm not certain, and in any case I can't test them for a decent period of a month or 2, because my wife, who does the shopping, hasn't transferred the stuff from the clear bags from the store, into D.M.'s Green Bags, and because I haven't made the effort to do it promptly myself, and even if I did, I'm not the one who "cooks" w/ the celery, clementine oranges, lettuce, etc., for the week or 2 or 3 in which the food either stays good or goes stale.
ENJOY!
Customer Review: Moisture problem solution
Summary: 5 Stars
I have had the green bags for about 9 months. I have only used them for lettuce and they are wonderful. I find that Romaine lettuce lasts as long as 2 1/2 weeks when using these bags. I didn't detect any difference in taste and the lettuce stayed nice and crisp.
A Solution to the Moisture Problem:
As other posts have mentioned, there is a moisture build up in the bags when they are in the refrigerator. I tried wiping the bags when I found moisture. This was tedious. Next I tried wrapping the lettuce in paper towels. This worked fairly well, but I had to replace the paper towels after 2 or 3 days. This used a lot of paper towels. I finally tried wrapping the lettuce in thin cotton hand towels that I purchased at a Kragen Auto Supply store and this worked very well. The towels just get slightly damp and don't have to be constantly replaced. I just wrap the lettuce in a towel and put it in the bag. These hand towels (from Kragen Auto Supply) are meant for shop clean-up and are much thinner and smaller than a bathroom hand towel. They come in a package of 10 or a package of 20 the last time I purchased them. The cost was about $10 for a package of 20. They measure about 15 inches by 14 inches. It is likely that this type of shop clean-up towel is available at other auto supply stores. These are cheap, low quality cotton hand towels likely made in India or Pakistan. The towels also work well as a kitchen dish towel and to wipe up kitchen spills. After the towels have gone through the laundry 25 to 30 times, I use them for house cleaning purposes.