Frozen Food

[lost66]

Howdy!
For more than 2 years I have fed my fish using Rod's Food Herbivore Blend. Despite the high price I noticed this is the best value because there a lot of "meet" and not that much water. A small piece contains a lot of food so small package lasts me for 1-2 months. Couple weeks ago my LFS told me the price skyrocketed like 60% up so I bought mysis shrimp from Hikari but honestly I don't like it that much - too small for my fish. So I decided to do what I wanted to do which is my own frozen food.

In this thread I would like to share my experience with my first frozen food. I didn't do much investigation about exact amounts or what brings what. I read 2 threads and I combined list of ingredients and I purchased what I had locally without looking for weeks exact, very expensive ingredient. I live near Raleigh, NC and we have a Grand Asia Market nearby. I have no idea if this story has a good selection of stuff since I don't have anything to compare but most of ingredients were available. I try to run my tank on budget so picked mostly frozen stuff. They had many nice fish I've only seen during scuba diving but they were on a pricey side so this is what I purchased:
1) Bay Scallops

2) Sea Food Mix

3) Mussels

4) Shrimps - I wanted the whole thing but they only got fresh and very expensive, huge ones

5) Squid

6) Clams

7) 1lb of fresh salmon

For additives I used 1lb of broccoli, 1 pack of spinach, 25 sheets of of nori. From my stash which I don't use very often I decided to use almost whole bottle of reef chilli and around 3/4 of bottle of amino acids.

I used ninja blender and blend everything.

I mixed everything in a bucket using concrete mixer on a drill.

I packed everything to a zip bags and free.
In total it is 10lb of yummy food. The cost of ocean part was $75. I think all together around $100.

My thoughts of the process
1) It is a good idea to peel salmon, skin doesn't blend good. I ended up with a lot of bigger pieces of salmon skin but I am not that super worried because I noticed my anemones grabbed the bigger pieces.
2) blending nori, spinach and brocoli was a challenge. I added 3 caps of rodi which helped.
3) The final texture of the product is a challenge. I have both big and small fish, plenty of anemones so in my case I think everything will be consumed eventually but targeting to exact texture is not easy. Definitely take your time to research what blends with what and what should be bigger and what should be smaller parts
4) Messy, stinky process.
5) this food is "fatty" in texture. It clamps easily in the tank so I have to change the way I feed little bit. The food I used to buy (I don't remember the name but
They way I feed my fish is to put a small portion in the cup, pour rodi, wait few minutes and then strain everything so I am flushing most of the liquid from the food. By that I hope to minimize phosphate intake. I will monitor my tank daily for few weeks to see how much phosphate/nitrate I add which my tank doesn't metabolize.

The end result is nice from my point of view. I don't know what will be the impact on that closed ecosystem though. Time will tell and I will post an update in few weeks or when I see something bad. So far so good, fish enjoy my food https://photos.app.goo.gl/QPtyV4evaRAgU5vu6

I hope this post will help anyone who is interested in DIY food.

 

[Tavero]

I wouldnt reccomend salmon. It has too much fat that will separate during feeding and float in top of the water surface. Pangansius or cod is a better choice.

 

[dstockwell]

I pretty much did the same thing except for brocolli and very little nori, used cod instead of Salmon, and added Selcon. 4 total bags will last at least a year and half.

 

[lost66]

I wouldnt reccomend salmon. It has too much fat that will separate during feeding and float in top of the water surface. Pangansius or cod is a better choice.

This explains a lot.Thanks! Next batch (in 2 years? ) I will use cod.

 

[vetteguy53081]

Howdy!
For more than 2 years I have fed my fish using Rod's Food Herbivore Blend. Despite the high price I noticed this is the best value because there a lot of "meet" and not that much water. A small piece contains a lot of food so small package lasts me for 1-2 months. Couple weeks ago my LFS told me the price skyrocketed like 60% up so I bought mysis shrimp from Hikari but honestly I don't like it that much - too small for my fish. So I decided to do what I wanted to do which is my own frozen food.

In this thread I would like to share my experience with my first frozen food. I didn't do much investigation about exact amounts or what brings what. I read 2 threads and I combined list of ingredients and I purchased what I had locally without looking for weeks exact, very expensive ingredient. I live near Raleigh, NC and we have a Grand Asia Market nearby. I have no idea if this story has a good selection of stuff since I don't have anything to compare but most of ingredients were available. I try to run my tank on budget so picked mostly frozen stuff. They had many nice fish I've only seen during scuba diving but they were on a pricey side so this is what I purchased:
1) Bay Scallops

2) Sea Food Mix

3) Mussels

4) Shrimps - I wanted the whole thing but they only got fresh and very expensive, huge ones

5) Squid

6) Clams

7) 1lb of fresh salmon

For additives I used 1lb of broccoli, 1 pack of spinach, 25 sheets of of nori. From my stash which I don't use very often I decided to use almost whole bottle of reef chilli and around 3/4 of bottle of amino acids.

I used ninja blender and blend everything.

I mixed everything in a bucket using concrete mixer on a drill.

I packed everything to a zip bags and free.
In total it is 10lb of yummy food. The cost of ocean part was $75. I think all together around $100.

My thoughts of the process
1) It is a good idea to peel salmon, skin doesn't blend good. I ended up with a lot of bigger pieces of salmon skin but I am not that super worried because I noticed my anemones grabbed the bigger pieces.
2) blending nori, spinach and brocoli was a challenge. I added 3 caps of rodi which helped.
3) The final texture of the product is a challenge. I have both big and small fish, plenty of anemones so in my case I think everything will be consumed eventually but targeting to exact texture is not easy. Definitely take your time to research what blends with what and what should be bigger and what should be smaller parts
4) Messy, stinky process.
5) this food is "fatty" in texture. It clamps easily in the tank so I have to change the way I feed little bit. The food I used to buy (I don't remember the name but
They way I feed my fish is to put a small portion in the cup, pour rodi, wait few minutes and then strain everything so I am flushing most of the liquid from the food. By that I hope to minimize phosphate intake. I will monitor my tank daily for few weeks to see how much phosphate/nitrate I add which my tank doesn't metabolize.

The end result is nice from my point of view. I don't know what will be the impact on that closed ecosystem though. Time will tell and I will post an update in few weeks or when I see something bad. So far so good, fish enjoy my food https://photos.app.goo.gl/QPtyV4evaRAgU5vu6

I hope this post will help anyone who is interested in DIY food.

Im a little leery of the seafood blend ( what are the ingredients) other wise looks good and yes, even the darn food for the fish has skyrocketed- would not say 60% but at least 20%
Blend looks good otherwise

 

[lost66]

Im a little leery of the seafood blend ( what are the ingredients)

Good point. I didn't check when I grabbed it but I just checked and all good stuff I think: mussel meat, squid, surimi, clam meat.

 

[vetteguy53081]

Good point. I didn't check when I grabbed it but I just checked and all good stuff I think: mussel meat, squid, surimi, clam meat.

Yes, that should be good and safe to use

 

[G Santana]

Eventually many folks go this route and they wind up laughing at the amount of money they had previously spent vs. what they spend on DIY.
I go much easier, shrimp, clams and scallops for the last year.
Love it when people go the DIY route and save BIG!!!

 

[Spare time]

Good point. I didn't check when I grabbed it but I just checked and all good stuff I think: mussel meat, squid, surimi, clam meat.

You want to check for preservatives such as trisodium phosphate

 

[dstockwell]

Good point. I didn't check when I grabbed it but I just checked and all good stuff I think: mussel meat, squid, surimi, clam meat.

I threw away the surimi (fake crab) because it has added flavorings where of the rest the mix should not.

 

[lost66]

I threw away the surimi (fake crab) because it has added flavorings where of the rest the mix should not.

Thanks for the tip, makes sense. I will remove it from next batch.

 

[lost66]

fast forward 9 month later - I used maybe 15% of the batch. This stuff is super efficient. No fillers, pure meet. What is interesting, that fatty texture was an issue at the beginning but after a month or so I didn't notice any texture anymore. Looks like mixture sucked in all that fat nicely and food doesn't float at all.

 

[PeterEde]

I often think of visiting a local fish market for scraps.

 

[Brian Berry]

Howdy!
For more than 2 years I have fed my fish using Rod's Food Herbivore Blend. Despite the high price I noticed this is the best value because there a lot of "meet" and not that much water. A small piece contains a lot of food so small package lasts me for 1-2 months. Couple weeks ago my LFS told me the price skyrocketed like 60% up so I bought mysis shrimp from Hikari but honestly I don't like it that much - too small for my fish. So I decided to do what I wanted to do which is my own frozen food.

In this thread I would like to share my experience with my first frozen food. I didn't do much investigation about exact amounts or what brings what. I read 2 threads and I combined list of ingredients and I purchased what I had locally without looking for weeks exact, very expensive ingredient. I live near Raleigh, NC and we have a Grand Asia Market nearby. I have no idea if this story has a good selection of stuff since I don't have anything to compare but most of ingredients were available. I try to run my tank on budget so picked mostly frozen stuff. They had many nice fish I've only seen during scuba diving but they were on a pricey side so this is what I purchased:
1) Bay Scallops

2) Sea Food Mix

3) Mussels

4) Shrimps - I wanted the whole thing but they only got fresh and very expensive, huge ones

5) Squid

6) Clams

7) 1lb of fresh salmon

For additives I used 1lb of broccoli, 1 pack of spinach, 25 sheets of of nori. From my stash which I don't use very often I decided to use almost whole bottle of reef chilli and around 3/4 of bottle of amino acids.

I used ninja blender and blend everything.

I mixed everything in a bucket using concrete mixer on a drill.

I packed everything to a zip bags and free.
In total it is 10lb of yummy food. The cost of ocean part was $75. I think all together around $100.

My thoughts of the process
1) It is a good idea to peel salmon, skin doesn't blend good. I ended up with a lot of bigger pieces of salmon skin but I am not that super worried because I noticed my anemones grabbed the bigger pieces.
2) blending nori, spinach and brocoli was a challenge. I added 3 caps of rodi which helped.
3) The final texture of the product is a challenge. I have both big and small fish, plenty of anemones so in my case I think everything will be consumed eventually but targeting to exact texture is not easy. Definitely take your time to research what blends with what and what should be bigger and what should be smaller parts
4) Messy, stinky process.
5) this food is "fatty" in texture. It clamps easily in the tank so I have to change the way I feed little bit. The food I used to buy (I don't remember the name but
They way I feed my fish is to put a small portion in the cup, pour rodi, wait few minutes and then strain everything so I am flushing most of the liquid from the food. By that I hope to minimize phosphate intake. I will monitor my tank daily for few weeks to see how much phosphate/nitrate I add which my tank doesn't metabolize.

The end result is nice from my point of view. I don't know what will be the impact on that closed ecosystem though. Time will tell and I will post an update in few weeks or when I see something bad. So far so good, fish enjoy my food https://photos.app.goo.gl/QPtyV4evaRAgU5vu6

I hope this post will help anyone who is interested in DIY food.

 

[Thumbster]

How do you know when to stop blending or if it needs some water added? I haven’t tried it yet but I’m afraid to blend it too much and end up with a mess that just turns into a cloud when it thaws in the tank.

I just went to the grocery this weekend to look for ingredients. I found shrimp, scallops and I think they had cod. I ended up buying some shrimp and scallops to eat but cut up a little bit before cooking for the two clowns and snails that I have.