Your freezer is messing with your food
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- Опубліковано 26 лют 2024
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Freezing is an awesome way to preserve food - but it isn’t perfect.
𝗧𝗵𝗲 𝘀𝗰𝗶𝗲𝗻𝘁𝗶𝗳𝗶𝗰 𝗻𝗶𝘁𝘁𝘆-𝗴𝗿𝗶𝘁𝘁𝘆:
-Dang DS, Bastarrachea LJ, Martini S, Matarneh SK (2021). Crystallization Behavior and Quality of Frozen Meat. Foods 10(11):2707. doi: 10.3390/foods10112707.
-Dawson P, Al-Jeddawi W, Rieck J (2020). The Effect of Different Freezing Rates and Long-Term Storage Temperatures on the Stability of Sliced Peaches. International Journal of Food Science 9178583. doi: 10.1155/2020/9178583.
-Lee YS, Saha A, Xiong R, Owens CM, Meullenet JF (2008). Changes in Broiler Breast Fillet Tenderness, Water-Holding Capacity, and Color Attributes during Long-Term Frozen Storage. Journal of Food Science 73(4). doi:10.1111/j.1750-3841.2008.00734.x
-Li D, Zhu Z, Sun D (2018). Effects of freezing on cell structure of fresh cellular food materials: A review, Trends in Food Science & Technology. doi: 10.1016/j.tifs.2018.02.019
-Liu Y, Wu Y, Che F, Zhang Z, Chen B (2019). Physical-Chemical Composition and Quality Related Changes in "Ruaner" Pear (Pyrus ussuriensis) During Freezing-Thawing Period. Molecules 24(14):2611. doi: 10.3390/molecules24142611.
-Love RM, Haraldsson SB (1961). The expressible fluid of fish fillets. XI.-ice crystal formation and cell damage in cod muscle frozen before rigor mortis. Journal of the Science of Food and Agriculture 12(6), 442-449. doi:10.1002/jsfa.2740120603
- Martino MN, Zaritzky NE (1988). Ice Crystal Size Modifications during Frozen Beef Storage. Journal of Food Science 53(6): 1631-1637. doi:10.1111/j.1365-2621.1988.tb07802.x
-Powrie, WD (1984) Chemical Effects During Storage of Frozen Foods. Journal of Chemical Education 61(4), 340. doi.org/10.1021/ed061p340
𝗚𝗼𝗼𝗱 (𝗮𝗰𝗰𝗲𝘀𝘀𝗶𝗯𝗹𝗲) 𝗿𝗲𝗳𝗲𝗿𝗲𝗻𝗰𝗲𝘀:
-www.americastestkitchen.com/c...
-www.seriouseats.com/freezer-a...
-foodprint.org/blog/the-foodpr...
-extension.missouri.edu/public...
-buyranchdirect.com/blogs/news...
-porkgateway.org/resource/wate...
𝗦𝘂𝗽𝗲𝗿-𝗵𝗲𝗹𝗽𝗳𝘂𝗹 𝗲𝘅𝗽𝗲𝗿𝘁𝘀 𝘄𝗵𝗼 𝗰𝗼𝗺𝗺𝘂𝗻𝗶𝗰𝗮𝘁𝗲𝗱 𝘄𝗶𝘁𝗵 𝗺𝗲 𝗮𝗯𝗼𝘂𝘁 𝘁𝗵𝗶𝘀 𝘁𝗼𝗽𝗶𝗰:
-Dr. Dennis Heldman, Professor of Food Engineering at the Ohio State University
MinuteFood is created by Kate Yoshida, Arcadi Garcia & Leonardo Souza, and produced by Neptune Studios LLC.
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As you said, fish contains more water than other meats, but did you know that water also contains more fish than other meats? The more you know!
I'd beg to differ
Wait, that's a really confusing comment xD
r/technicallycorrect
Damnit dude, you made me laugh a little too hard at that dumb joke. Good job.
@@SkullTheLeglessthen beg
Frozen produce is often "fresher" than fresh produce because flash freezing is not only effective but also done immediately as it's being harvested. Depending on what you're buying and where, fresh produce at your store has been sitting out for days, or has even been frozen and thawed for display.
Yes! That's why I have peas in my freezer at any time. Super convenient, healthy, tasty, and pretty!
I've heard this, but I've never tasted it...
Sometimes
It's a different type of damage, and depending on your needs, one can be better than the other.
yeah this video dumb
Sort of an extension of the thin layer tip - food freezes faster if it's in smaller pieces. Frozen peas benefit greatly from that fact!
Especially because they can be frozen in a fluidised bed freezer. Fast moving cold air keeps the peas moving so each one can be frozen individually.
@@barneylaurance1865 Which is the reason frozen peas have gone from a mushy jucky thing in the 1970s and 1980s to something that actually tastes well. Better and faster freezing techniques.
111th thumb
@@barneylaurance1865 I didn't know fluidized bed freezers were a thing, now THATS a fun fact
This is why you huddle up with a buddy to stay warm.
Flash freezing is probably one of the most important innovations in the past century.
Chest freezers also help slowing down the crystal rearrangement because they have more consistent internal temperature! The cold air doesn't escape via convection bc the cold air stays down on the freezer so opening it doesn't create as high of a temperature change other freezers! (This also is a factor to their reduced energy consumption!)
Hey, there’s a Technology Connections video about that!
Also there's usually no defrost cycle
@@wooooooo_Oo That is why there are no frost systems for some freezers. These take out most of the humidity out of the air, preventing the build up of ice in the freezer.
The little Rotom made me happy
Word
Worked in an ice cream factory years ago that made magnum type ice creams, the freezer there that froze the product after extrusion was -40C. You could only enter for a limited amount of time if it was necessary.
Cool trivia - that means it was also -40F, cos that is the point both temperature scales sync up : )
@@mcv2178 Didn't realise that! Thanks.
Somewhere in my hippie/punk cookery past in the 1970s I learned the trick of freezing and thawing tofu - and then crumbling it up to add "meat-like" texture to vegan chili etc. Especially great for day-ahead cooking so the crumbles can absorb lots of flavor goodness.
Great suggestions! I always struggle a lot with tofu. I'll give freezing a try.
Considering that cooking is just a controlled way to damage food to be made edible, freezing some kinds of foods is kinda a cooking process.
Finally, someone explained to me why the texture gets so much worse after the food stays in the freezer for a long time. Thank you, MinuteFood :) I've frozen some fatty fish like salmon myself for up to 2 weeks with no moisture loss, but any time I bought already frozen salmon it weeped a lot and tasted dry. By the way, this freezing "damage" is also a good thing when it comes to making octopus more tender.
Oooohhhh, octopus is a GREAT example - thanks, Helen!
How long should you freeze octopus? And should you freeze it slowly to cause more cell damage?
Hi Ms Rennie, your recommendation brought me here! 👍
@@michaelwesterland1853 Welcome!
@@MinuteFood I guess you noticed I just subscribed 😃. You do good work and the topics are interesting. BTW the Matfer is a great pan but that handle is so long I could barely fit it in my old KitchenAid oven to season it!
I use st. steel, cast iron, carbon steel and one Tramontina 10" nonstick here at home and they're all very fine. But Mandi's wok (from Souped up Recipes) can do everything! 👍
Some of the damage is not due to the crystal structure but due to the expansion of water as it freezes this is why flash freezing that crosses quickly the maximal volume area does not cause as much damage
And why does water expand when it freezes? Because of its crystalline molecular structure.
I became a wizard to freeze my food with frost magic instantly. I don't actually eat any of it though, I use it at dinner parties and restaurants for a laugh.
That is why flashfrozen food are equal (or in some case better) to fresh food because the crystallisation doesn't alter the structure of the food but kills pathogenes and doesn't destroy nutrients. In industrial settings, some products will be IQFed (Individually Quick Frozen) then misted with water to create an adittional layer of protection to the produce before being pack and sold. These products will last much longer in the freezer before frost damage occure. Industrial sous-vide + flashfreezing = Virtualy unperishable, as long as the seal is not broken and the cold chain is not disturbed.
❄️🍓🥩🥦🍤❄️
I never heard of the layer of protection. That's great.
I work in a lab with bacteria, and to stop the cells being damaged by freezing we drop samples in liquid nitrogen to freeze them quickly, then store them in a freezer at -80 °C (rather than the usual -20 °C). The same principles apply to biology as cooking, except we don't eat or work.
There's a typo at the very end. So I thought you were saying you didn't work.
"The same principles apply to biology as cooking, except we don't eat or work"
a great trick for freezing something fast (and for cooling down drinks fast) is to wrap the item in a wet paper towel! that wet paper will transmit the heat away much faster than just cold air blowing across the dry item
Here's a quick tip! Freeze the food at as cold as temperature and as quickly as possible. This will make many, tiny ice crystals (instead of a few large ones), which won't wreck the cellular structure 👍This is what large food companies do and why commercially frozen foods have better texture in the end!
This is a major reason why Gordon Ramsay could always tell when food was frozen and always advocated for fresh ingredients.
That is precisely the reason why I always freeze the pork loin before cooking it, as it tents to be very dry and tough when cooked fresh.
⛺️⛺️
Oh wow! An easy way to tenderize meat!
@@davidshi451 Here's an extra tip: If you marinate it before freezing it, all the flavours penetrate much better inside the meat.
If you have one try all pork in the sous vide cooking machines.
We found that pork loin and pork tenderloin vacpacked with seasoning and put in the sous vide bath for about 4 hours at °135 °140f then do a quick bowning on the outside makes a fork tender juicy pork.
Additionally, in most cities away from fishing points, it is almost always better to buy frozen fish as the « fresh one » are often unfrozen ones. And they, most of the time, end up up being more fresh ..
I wouldn't say they are more fresh, simply that it was preserved better.
I can confirm that freeze-damaged apples are perfect for apple crisp and pie. They're so soft and sweet!
Freezing meat AFTER cooking can help a lot to. You’ve already cooked off a bit of the moisture and broken the cells during cooking. This can really improve the quality of the final result. Plus, then you can pull out a portion and reheat and be ready to eat
thnk u for mentioning the tofu freezing trick!! i’ve been cooking for my roommates using this method and i always get lots of compliments about my tofu☺️☺️
I just don't thaw my strawberries and eat them frozen. Kind of like a healthier Popsicle.
another frozen fruit enjoyer
Personally find I prefer frozen blueberries to fresh ones, the texture feels weird/something like that.
I love to freeze all kinds of fruit, cut up in bite sized pieces! Because I usually don't intend to defrost them before eating, I'll have them frozen as a refreshing snack, especially during summers. Only sometimes I wait patiently and let the fruit defrost, because I like the soft mushy texture some fruits get, especially apples and pears. :)
3:54 I love the idea that fishing boats have a Rotom-Frost on hand lmao
Great video; I found it really interesting how the speed of freezing affects the texture via the number and size of crystals.
Congrats on two years!
Flip side: if you hate the texture of some things you can put it into the freezer before using it. My favorite thing to do is thinly slice celery and drop it into a bag in the freezer. When it comes out and then is cooked i get all the flavor and it basically melts. 10/10
I am so glad you mentioned the tofu and the other positive examples of the "ice dagger damage"
Turns out freezing food is a hot topic.
Myself, I almost got freezer burn from that big bowl of stracatella ice cream od yours...
12 hours ago?!? wtf
@@pumkin7222sponsor
Members exist I guess
Huh that's weird. How does this happen? Are you a channel member that got early access to the video?
@@cact0s_ulion405 yes he is
Tip - keep your fridge/freezer as full as possible without overcrowding. Use water bottles. This will minimize 'cold loss' when opening up your fridge. This is akin to living by a large body of water that keeps summers cooler and winters warmer. Water acts as a better temperature buffer versus air.
Shoutout to the Tillamook Ice Cream (mint chocolate chip flavoured I think) in the freezer there.
Personally a Tillamook Mudslide guy myself.
I have a few Midwest friends and they are always surprised to find that Tillamook cheese and Ice cream are..... not Midwestern at all, but from Oregon. Not just that but coastal Oregon, and also, a place I drive through every time I visit my grandmother.
Theres yer Santoast24 Fun Fact about something tangentially related to the video!
NAILED IT
Tillamook is good, but I find that the Umpqua brand edges it out just a bit. Especially their fudge and their cherry ice cream, you get big chunks of cherry that are actually juicy and flavorful.
0:09 that's a trick question, all fish at the grocery store is previously frozen unless it's still alive
Not where I live
@inea Unless you're shopping from an individual coastal fishmonger in a little market stall who sells what he just caught that morning, yes where you live too. It's done on the boat, immediately. Both for sake of longevity and for health safety. Your local stores will always be frozen then thawed, even if you live on the coast. Even if they say they didn't, because government regulation doesn't count that first freeze, only if it's thawed then refrozen. Unless, sometimes, if it's from a local inland farm.
@@maromania7 mate you're talking as if your regulatory body regulates the whole world. There are more places in the world with different laws. In the EU some fish is sold fresh and some thawed and it's mandatory for the fish to indicate if it has been frozen beforehand. It can be fresh even if you buy it inland
You know some people live next to the sea right ? We have in our grocery stores fresh fish that was caught in the night or super early in the morning.
Crazy you have a hard time fathoming this...
This channel is soooo good. I've watched every episode. Science, food, Kates presentation, Arcadi's animation. Just so good.
Congratulations on 2 years! And thank you for the (dino) nuggets of food/cooking information!
I froze a split avocado and it was gross, I made guacamole, froze it, and it was delicious and it kept its green-ness. I froze both in food saver bags with the air removed. Sometimes it is how you prepare before the freeze.
I freeze pears to get them mushy and then I make pear pudding out of them. Really great.
Just remember to peel and dice them before freezing.
Appreciate both the succinct breakdown AND the Infinity Gauntlet. 😊
I bought one of those My Mochi boxes from Target and they didn't even make it home before we ate them all up in the car lol.
An advice to freezing is also to cut the food to portions or cube it if it's veggies. You essentially increase the surface area exposed to the freezer, everything freezes to the core faster, while also being a great option for a lazy day meal.
I cannot stress enough how great chest freezers are: They're so efficient they essentially only cost you the price of buying it and some room, because the cold air pools at the bottom and is mostly undisturbed even with constant opening and closing, and it can reach much colder temperatures making it the closes analogue for flash-freezing things domestically.
I'm glad I was watching because I noticed the Rotom cameo!
Don't forget that deep-freezing is a *requirement* to make uncooked fish safe to eat! We couldn't have sushi, sashimi, or poke without it!
thank you for making these videos they always make me smile!
Thank you Minute Food. Always appreciate your content.
I alwasy have some tofu frozen. After thawing you can squeeze out more moisture and it gets easier zu crisp up.
And even if you don't actively squeeze the moisture out, it indeed soaks up more flavor.
Big congrats on 2 years of great content! You’ve been such a great addition to the minute* genre!
Technically, if you freeze fast enough and cold enough, AND keep it there, you can form amorphous ice that isn't sharp. The glass transition temperature of water is -130C, and you have to keep it below that, or it will turn into crystals and exhibit grain growth, so you also have to thaw it quickly, but its theoretically possible. This requires even more cooling power than industrial flash freezers though, so probably not a practical solution
That's interesting. I wonder if it crystallizes as you defrost it, though. Because amorphic ice cream sounds awesome.
It will, unless you thaw it super fast. It will melt from glass, than be below the crystalization temperature and crystallize
@@noob19087
Love learning from this channel!
I thought I was weird for loving the texture of frozen strawberries (both frozen and also mushy/thawed)! Maybe I’m still weird but thanks for explaining that there’s reason to my madness! 😅
Fantastic video as always
I've seen how food in "Frost-Free" freezers have more freezer burn than ones without a defrost cycle and knew exactly what you pointed out here....
Wonderful vid! That was the perfect mix of approachable, curious, enlightening and entertaining :)
Very good work!
Thanks!
A seriously great video! This really is one of the very best channels on UA-cam.
When cooking I often think about the chemistry behind it thanks to this channel. And I have 2 video content suggestions that would help me:
1. If I fail seasoning my pan and my food starts to sticks to it. What would be the best way to "save" my dish? Trying to gentle peel it of often damages the food. What about decreasing the temperature? Or adding more grease? What is the best way to save it and unstick it with minimal damage.
Second suggestion is that I notice everyone has different flavor preferences, so that makes it also difficult to assess if your dish is too salty or greasy or whatever just because you like that particular trait more than others. What are some telling signs to pay attention to to know if your dish is too much of your particular preference. For example when I make Belgian stew, the sauce sometimes is not thick enough. Some ways to solve it are stew longer without a lit to evaporate moisture, add sauce thickener like flour, maizena or a slice of bread.. So I could learn from paying attention to certain signs early, but also some resolutions to improve the otherwise failed dish. :)
Amazing video! Thank you so much!
Congratulations on 2 years of amazingness! Thanks, Minute Food!
Great info !!!
Vacuum sealing bags can also help with moisture retention especially in meats
Oh! Frozen brie! I've never thought about that, but now MUST try it.
Great tip on the tofu too, I always liked that texture but never knew where it came from.
If something is particularly warm, it may be a good idea to put it in the fridge to get it cool, but not cool enough for freezing, and then tossing it in the freezer once it's at the fridge temp
Also when freezing fruit (like my amazing garden raspberries) it helps to use a heavy and pre-"frozen" ceramic plate, not a room temperature plate!
I love this channel so much
I love flash-frozen perfectly ripe produce (Broccoli). That and other veggie mixtures make getting my veggies in far easier than keeping a supply of unfrozen long travelled stuff. Eat your greens folks!
I love your videos!!
Now we know what Gordon Ramsay meant by "tasting frozen"
My mom and grandma talks about frozen pears a lot XD how they would freeze it over in the winter snow and it would become a mushy slushy like treat XD and how difficult it was to get lots of these ingredients 😅
Dang that was a good pun. Love your videos!
Cool tips!
Gotta try the frozen pears soon! Maybe you can do it with other fruits too? Seems like a fun thing to try
ice crystals doing funky shuffles is interesting
The unstable-reorganisation of ice crystals animation was beautiful!
Congratulations on two years!
Ok, now I have to add frozen broccoli to my shopping cart!
Never thought about freezing tofu, thanks for the tips :)
Thanks for this!!!!!
For anyone that wants to store veggies etc, if you chop them first, freeze them, and cook then without thawing, it is much better. Granted, the more watery the vegetable is, the mushier it gets, but if you chop them up and then cook them while still frozen it’s much better
Happy birthday, Minute Food!
5:05 - Once upon the time Adriatic fishermen used to wack octopuses they caught against rocks to tenderize them. Now they just freeze them.
Two years already.
Wonder if this effect can be used to increase the allicin in some dishes. The intent here is using less effort, like assuming the garlic was whole or sliced rather than crushed. Wonder if there are other compounds where the effects of freezing would be beneficial.
I've been wondering that too, and tried it the last time I prepared garlic. It did give a nice boost to allicin production, but I'm not sure if the effort was significantly less, since the usual preparation to let the alliin and alliinase mingle was also useful to help in dispersing the garlic. Maybe it would make more of a difference for other dishes.
5:07 I also have found this technique makes blueberry muffins sweet and gooey instead of their initial bread like taste/texture
I’m glad the only kid who opens my freezer to look for some delicious staff is me.
Proffesional Meat cutter with some food science training. The damage done can be mitigated with proper freezing, the term we use for that drip loss is "purge" and it happens regardless if you freeze or not but to a leser extent. You want.to freeze fast and cold 32f is not enough 0 is ok and -32 is ideal. Ive frozen steaks for a year in a deep freeze and they were still great after that time.
So does this also have something to do with thawing food?
A noticeable amount of chefs online swear that food which thaws overnight in the fridge is better than food thawing on the counter over a couple of hours.
This is a REALLY good question, but there isn't good scientific evidence to answer it; there are conflicting results regarding quality (like how much drip loss you get) when you thaw slower vs quicker.
@@MinuteFood Really interesting. Thank you for the answer! Hopefully we'll get a study in the future which can help shed light on the difference if any.
For now I'll probably keep doing, if not at least to make sure the outside of the meat doesn't reach a dangerous temperature (as in ideal temperature for microbial life) before the inside has thawn out.
Works great if you're trying to soften tough meat.
I see the tillamook Ice cream in your freezer!! My favorite brand of ice cream ever!! :)
Freezing or chilling then reheating things like pasta can also changes its properties.
Thanks
The way food crystallizes is probably a science in itself that someone is studying as we speak. Like how "fast" carbs can be chilled/frozen and turned into slower carbs (resistent starch) to mention one thing. My degree is as a dairy man, so I learned a bit about making ice cream and butter, and those two specifically requires temperature precision throughout the preparation process to get the most desirable end product because of how fat crystallizes. The reason why butter gets hard if left out to melt slightly then put back in the fridge is because of this. But the reason why ice cream gets hard when it has melted a bit and is put back in the freezer is because of the loss of air - of which there is a surprisingly lot of in ice cream. It's why it's sold by volume and not weight 😉
😂i like how "inevitable" was represented by the infinity gauntlet icon.
fun fact: all non-farmed fish was previously frozen. It came from miles away in the ocean. They have to keep it as fresh as possible, and so they freeze it whole.
Depends on your proximity to fishing spots
Not if you live next to the sea like me
so it's often better to buy the still frozen stuff, if possible, rather than the stuff they thawed and left sitting out. Especially if it's in a quantity that would require freezing anyway.
What about first refrigerating the food, then freezing it? In principle, that should make the freezing much quicker... Does it have downsides?
That doesn't make the freezing any faster though you just do part of the same process in a warmer environment which is actually slower in the end
yay!happy 2 year birthday!🤩🥳🎊🍰🎂
Essentially all wild caught marine fish is frozen on the boat so counterintuitively, frozen fish is generally better quality because ideally it has gone through less freeze/thaw cycles than “fresh” fish. I switched to only buying frozen salmon years ago and the quality is generally much higher.
Great tips, thank you!
Those cinematic plans are insane !
Really happy for this 2y ❤
just put your food in a pressure chamber and raise to 100mpa, then freeze the food. 3 phase diagram indicate it should maintain liquid state. Then release the pressure, every thing should instantly transform into ice without time for large crystal to form. Similar process is to use make aerogel, why not adopt it to food.
but pressurizing it makes it hot, right? making it then that much harder to freeze quickly?
Wait this also means that you can't freeze yourself to immortality. Dang it!
Yeah. This is the primary problem for cryogenics.
It just makes it more complicated, because you've got to perfuse some kind of anti-freeze compound through the blood vessel networks to prevent ice crystal formation. Things would certainly be a lot easier if water behaved like nearly every other liquid and didn't expand on freezing.
@@somewhatstrange2097 We are made out of the only material that is inconvient to freeze lmao.