We get it, those plastic-looking bags aren’t too glamorous. But they could be a huge help in a survival situation. Simply put, storing food for a crisis is a smart decision.
One approach on food storage is to pack dry goods, like rice and beans, for long haul stockpiling in Mylar bags.
Food preservation, when done correctly, can keep food fresh for quite a long time, often longer than customary food stockpiling strategies. Utilizing mylar bags with air & moisture absorbers can add additional time for storage, as long as 30 years!
What is a Mylar Bag?
The term “Mylar,” like “Xerox,” is a brand name that has become synonymous with a general product. Mylar technically refers to DuPont’s brand of PET (Ployethylene Terephthalate) sheet, but the term “Mylar” been adopted to refer to any durable PET plastic sheet material. Don’t worry, PET does not have any bisphenols (BPA being the worst one our there) so PET will not contaminate your food whatsoever.
Mylar bags are produced using many layers of overlaid food-grade plastic and plasticized aluminum. Food won’t interact with aluminum since it is isolated by a food-grade plastic coating. Mylar bags give great light, moisture, and oxygen protection to ensure the food inside the bag stays fresh nad edible. Ensure the Mylar storage products you buy are intended to store food products, though. Because without an air-tight seal, it doesn’t matter how great the material is.
Where Can You Find and Buy Some Mylar Bags?
We have curated some of the best Mylar bags and retailers for Mylar bags below so that you can make an informed choice!
On the off chance that you incline toward shopping physically, you can most likely get your Mylar bags at your local stores and grocery outlets. Whether it’s your online or physical shopping choices, consideration ought to be put on the quality of the Mylar bag, as it is not difficult to find fakes with the expansion of the market for Mylar food storage bags.
How to Seal a Mylar Bag
You can purchase Mylar bags in various shapes and sizes, and while keeping in mind that they are excellent at preserving food for a more drawn-out period of time, figuring out how to seal your Mylar bags is pretty much as significant as the actual preservation.
There are two techniques generally utilized for sealing Mylar packs, and this incorporates a clothing iron or hair straightener.
No matter the method utilized, the temperature of the iron should be adequately hot to give you the best outcomes and guarantee the iron isn’t steaming, for your food sources to accomplish the objective of drawn-out preservation, the Mylar bags should be sealed correctly to keep oxygen out. These techniques melt the plastic together slightly to make a perfect seal. Zip-loc style bags will let a bit of air through and spoil the food eventually.
Another good idea is vacuum sealing, however that’s not always easy with a Mylar bag.
Why Should You Use a Mylar Bag For Food Storage?
Mylar packaging is an obvious advantage of long-term storage of food due to the protection they offer from light, air, and temperature fluctuations. This is also why most industrial resistant food kits use Mylar bags.
The only thing you can be sure of is that Mylar bags are ideal for storing items due to their superior strength, suitable material and thermal insulation properties. On the other hand, the Mylar bag is sturdy, fit and simple enough to suit a beginner or experienced survivalist.
How Long Will Food Last in Mylar Bags?
Food can keep going for quite a long time in your Mylar bags, however this relies to a great extent upon 3 vital factors in particular:
1. Storage condition
2. Kind of food
3. The food must be sealed correctly.
These 3 key components will decide the period and life expectancy of your food when preserved with a Mylar bag. For most food varieties like canned products, their legitimacy period is projected to be 10 years, while all around dried food varieties, for example, beans and grains can keep going for 20-30 years.
At the point when the food is properly sealed, you are in a situation to have longer shelf life and have your food last surprisingly longer.
Can you Freeze Food in Mylar bags?
Indeed, you can, however, this ought to be for a brief period as Mylar bags are best fitted for dry food varieties. Mylar bags are explicitly created for dry and low-fat food varieties without moisture, in order to keep food from rotting. Perishables are still perishable, despite being in a Mylar bag!
Be that as it may, on the off chance that you wish to freeze your food for a brief period, you can utilize Mylar bags as they will give the ideal insurance to you, not at all like with dry foods, the time span of usability of the food can’t be preserved for an extensive stretch as Mylar bags are best fitted for dry and low fat food varieties.
Disadvantages of Mylar bags
If vermin get a sniff and are onto the trail of food, Mylar bags are not safe against them. Mylar bags are more delicate than jars or plastic buckets and ought to be dealt with and stored cautiously.
Another issue is that the Mylar bags don’t stack well, as opposed to cans. They leave a great deal of void space in a sack or bucket so they occupy more space. The most ideal approach to save space utilizing a Mylar pack is to utilize the big 5-gallon bags within a bucket.
Advantages of Mylar bags
Mylar bags protect against sunlight, moisture, and any insects that might want to get at your food supply. They make a barrier which broadens the timeframe of realistic usability of the food items.
Bags can be made in an assortment of sizes. Some are little enough to seal a bunch of garden seeds for storage, others are sufficiently big enough to fill up a 5-gallon container. The Mylar sacks can be cleaned out and reused subsequent to removing the first seal.
Mylar bags are great for food storage because they are relatively cheap and easy to use. Check out some of the links below for our favorite Mylar bags. In-depth reviews will be coming soon!
Our Favorite Mylar Bags For Food Storage
You’ll notice that we only chose to show you bags that are heat-sealable. There are many Mylar bags on the market that use a zip-lock type seal. We have found that many of these “resealable” Mylar food storage bags do not offer a true air-tight seal. And THAT makes us nervous when we are storing food for long periods of time. So although the convenience of a resealable bag might be tempting, if you’re storing food for the long haul, use heat-seal Mylar bags.