Just curious if it makes a difference in storage life span for grains, rice, popcorn, etc. Is the key here just to get the oxygen out? Or is there a benefit to nitrogen?
If you are going with grains, rice, popcorn then using nitrogen would be better. If you are trying to dry meats...use the dry ice. Cut the meat into smaller slices and place it somewhere surrounded by dry ice. It will suck the moisture out of it in under 36 hours from what I have read. No first had experience though.
Get rid of the oxygen with any inert gas that will displace it. The advantage of CO2 against N2 is that it's heavier than air and won't diffuse out nearly as quickly as N2 which is quite close to air in molecular weight. Note that using dry ice could frost damage some products if left in contact for very long. I'm way less sure that dry ice will do any moisture removal. Worth checking.
If your dealing with Gases, the CO2 is slightly better than N2, when coming from a Tank or Bottle, as it is heavier than N2 which is also Heavier than Air..... Dry Ice or Solid CO2, can Freezer Burn (Dehydrate) Products, if allowed to not boil off in a reasonable amount of time. Purging the O2 is what your looking for, MOSTLY, and any of the above methods, will do that.....
before the 1990's the dry ice (co2) method was the only way to go for the home/DIY packing of LTS food containers .... dairy products are the foods that really benefit from a co2 or nitogen purge ..... everything else is good to go with simple 02 absorbers ..... I don't know any of the professional food packers that mess with the old methods much anymore .... messing with dry ice and nitrogen isn't for everyone .....
