Mylar bags for long term storage

[Sparrow]

If mylar bags are 1 buck a bag, doesn't it make more sense to put stuff in 'regular' bags ... then in a 7$ bin?

I mean, rodents are so not going to care about those expensive bags ... nommm nommm

[ladyhk13]

We have a "commercial" vacuum machine and use regular food saver bags. I normally have no problem with them puncturing or not sealing properly...if I do, it's usually due to operator error. If you are using mylar you do need to make sure it's food grade. Just like if you are going to store food in buckets without any bags (just putting the food in them) they also need to be food grade, if not the toxins from the plastic will leach into your food.
I put rice, noodles, sugar and even flour in my food saver bags. The ones that come with my machine don't even work as good as the ones you can buy in bulk at sam's or costco (a green box). We use them for all of our bulk meats as well.

[Sniper-T]

I too use the traditional vacu-sealer bags, with a pro series vac. I then store these in 30 gallon steel drums. I empty/replace everything in the barrels about every 6 months... as in open them up, put the newest stuff in the back (bottom), and rotate it through, with the oldest available coming into the pantry. I am currently rotating out some of my original Ziplock storage bags of rice/pasta from 4-5 years ago, with no smell or freshness issues. Everything tastes as fresh as new.

I have piles of homemade MRE's that I'm making and storing too (lasagne/Chili/Stroghanoff, etc) that are also stored in Ziplocks. I don't know if they'll stand the test of time for true LTS (10-20 year), but for mid-term, they've been serving fine. The oldest Vacu sealed anything I have is less than 2 years... but they seem to be holding vaccuum well, and I open the odd one of something as a test. They seem to be fine as well