Cooking frozen foods

DRIP LOSS OF COOKED, FROZEN, OR OTHERWISE PROCESSED FOODS... 

Starch is used in frozen foods for the same reason it is used in fresh, refrigerated or canned foods, i.e. for thickening, low-temperature stability and control of the flow character of the food. Freezing exacerbates syneresis in other components of the food system, such as fruit tissue, increasing the demand for water entrainment by the starch. Frozen dinners are cooked, cooled, packaged and flash frozen. Fruit pie fillings are mixed, heated, cooled, filled into shells and flash frozen. Freezing introduces stability demands beyond the other forms of distribution. The stability of the starch... 

The study was also carried out taking into account the recipes used in the mentioned areas to prepare dilferent meals according to the local cooking traditions. Foods and prepared meals were homogenized using a blender equipped with titanium blades, packed in acid-washed polypropylene containers, and deep-frozen at -40°C. 

Refrigeration In the event of a power loss, refrigerators will keep food cold for approximately 4 to 5 hours, if unopened. Blocks of ice or dry ice can be used to extend the life of food. Only foods that have a normal color and odor should be consumed, and perishable foods should be discarded after 2 hours at room temperature regardless of their appearance or smell. Frozen food can be kept frozen with dry ice, but once thawed must be immediately cooked or discarded. As with refrigerated food, frozen food that thaws and has been at room temperature for 2 hours must be discarded. 

Freezing does not kill the bacteria, but it greatly slows their multiplication rate. When frozen food thaws, bacterial growth speeds up, especially if we allow the food to reach room temperature. If we then decide to refreeze the food, there will be more bacteria than there were in the first place when we thaw the food again, and they ll keep on multiplying. Some people wonder why this should matter. After all, when we cook the food, the bacteria will be destroyed. Heat indeed kills many bacteria, but some varieties — staphylococcus, for one — produce a heat-stable toxin. 

C (40°F) and has been out of the freezer for no more than twenty-four hours. Do not refreeze shellfish, dishes containing cream, or cooked foods, because they are particularly prone to bacterial growth. You can often tell if a frozen food has previously been thawed its package will be frost-coated, because when the food thawed moisture escaped from it and then refroze. 

The relative merits of vitamin E supplementation for delaying warmed-over flavor (WOF) in muscle foods have been investigated. Webb et al. (1972) studied the effects of a-tocopheryl acetate supplementation on oxidative stability and flavor of broiler parts, which were pre-cooked, frozen and then re-heated. The supplementation of broilers with 11 or 22 lU a-tocopheryl acetate for 36 days resulted in pre-cooked meat with lower TEA values than that from non-supplemented birds. However, a sensory panel could not detect any treatment difference in flavor assessment. The panel did, however, corroborate a positive effect demonstrated... 

Microwave heating may be preferable to other ways of cooking unthawed frozen foods because when food is penetrated by the microwaves cooking proceeds uniformly throughout, whereas in other ways of cooking the heat acts mainly on the outside of the food, which may become overcooked, while the interior is undercooked. 

There is an increasing demand for ready-prepared foods for final re-heating or cooking in microwave ovens. Applications are for retail sale of take-away meals and factory/ office and institution catering. Such foods maybe frozen and will then have a longer storage life, but will require frozen storage. 

Annex II lists foodstuffs for which only certain of the annex I additives may be used. Such foodstuffs include cocoa products and chocolate products, fruit juices and nectars, jam, jellies and marmalades and partially dehydrated and dehydrated milk, which are the subjects of EU vertical standards, and a number of other foods including frozen unprocessed fmit and vegetables, quick-cook rice, non-emulsified oils and fats, canned and bottled fruit and vegetables, bread made with basic ingredients only, fresh pasta and beer. 

Downey, G. (2002). Quality changes in frozen and thawed, cooked pureed vegetables containing hydrocolloids, gums and dairy powders. Int. J. Food Sci. TechnoL, 37, 869-877. 

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