With the qualifier that it’s not known to be unhealthy, and preserving fruit to eat in the future is considered better than eating no fruit at all because you’re afraid of spoilage.
Freezing changes a liquid in to a solid. Freezing fruit stops a bunch of microorganisms in the fruit from dancing around because the water needed for growth has turned into solid ice crystals.
So picture your strawberry ready to begin spoiling if you leave it out on the table. But when you put it in the freezer instead, the spoiling process cannot go forward. And the fruit stays as it is.
Understanding this fact about freezing fruit supports efficient eating. You can buy fresh fruit at supermarkets, farmers’ markets, or by the side of the road, and know that you can preserve what you bought for months, maybe years. Some believe the taste is irrevocably altered when fruit is frozen for a long time, and there is no doubt fresh picked ripe fruit eaten in the moment tastes sweeter than flash frozen and transported fruit – but the nutritional value and contribution to your healthy diet is believed to be the same.
And since we cannot all transport to tropical islands to stay healthy, we have to manage our fresh fruit as we find it.
Buy your fresh fruit in bulk and use freezer bags or other containers to store it in the freezer. You can separate the fruit by the week, assuming you bought fresh fruit that would last one week.
But frozen food should not be kept forever. In fact the Mayo Clinic stated in an article that people should do at least an annual ‘freeze’ clean to remove older frozen food that may no longer look or taste edible.
For busy entrepreneurs, the purpose of freezing fresh fruit is to preserve the quality for at least two to four weeks, not months. The best practice would be to purchase large quantities of fresh fruit, especially berries, and separate them into smaller freezer sized containers or bags for later consumption.
The Efficient Eater website is specifically dedicated to maintaining productivity by finding fast, efficient and easy ways to cook and eat using bulk cooking, freezing your food, and heating the meals up to two to four weeks later.
The idea is to keep cooked food preserved over time so that the busy entrepreneur does not have to take time out of her day, every day, to cook.
For those who are against frozen food or re-heating, this process will not work for you.
But if you are on the fence because you’ve heard some strange things about frozen food…read on.
In our millennia long quest to make food preparation easier, humankind has made incredible strides. From the invention of fire to microwaves and the refrigerated truck, each year seems to bring a simplified method for meeting our nutritional needs. Of course, many of these advances have come at a cost. Land has been irrevocably altered to satisfy industrial agriculture, and waste and pollution have skyrocketed to produce for the sake of convenience.
Yet since survival is our first basic instinct, and food is critical to survival there are few who would support altering the mass production of food that has permitted so many to maintain their lives. Instead, we have to consider how we can continue our advancements without causing more destruction.
For Efficient Eaters who are also trying to stay healthy, one solution is to take advantage of healthy, sustainable purchase options like farmers markets, but to reduce the time burden of using this service by buying in bulk, cooking, and freezing the food.
Although leafy vegetables, creams and other dairy products are not the best choices for freezing, almost every other food will work, and provide meals for weeks to come.
For this efficiency strategy to work, you need to be able to freeze food, and assuming the food was safe when you put it in the freezer, you do not need to fear that there will be a problem when you take it out.
The USDA exceptions include canned food and food in shells, like eggs. But even these examples have exceptions (to the exception). You can always take food out of a can and put it in a freezer container for preservation. With eggs, the issue is not so much a health threat, but the alteration of texture. You can freeze eggs in the shell, but if the shell cracks, the yolk turns thick and syrupy and will no longer function as you may expect for your favorite recipe. But if you try it, especially if you are using the egg in a savory dish, you may find there is no issue.
Often the main reason people are afraid to freeze food for any length of time is because they fear an alteration of the taste. Some people believe you cannot freeze food because the after-freezing taste is not as good as the before-freezing taste. This is well…a matter of taste. It does not mean the food has gone bad.
But a changed taste may be the result of freezer burn. Because of this real issue in many freezers, some believe in the literal interpretation of the word ‘burn’ as if the food has been scorched beyond a recognizable taste. Freezer burn is the damage to food caused by dehydration or oxidation due to exposure to air. So the best way to avoid it is to use air tight containers. You can still eat freezer ‘burned’ food, if you can tolerate the potentially altered taste.
Frozen food is safe
The act of freezing stops molecules from moving around, which stops microbes – bacteria, yeast and molds – and microorganisms from growing. It’s the same thing that happens to you if you are frozen. You stop growing and decaying. The food, which has basically already died once to become food, does not die somehow die again to become inedible.
Instead, the minute you thaw the food, the microbes reactivate and you have to cook or eat (or both) before it goes bad. This is why thawing and refreezing can be an issue because if you leave the food at room temperature long enough to activate microbes, and then return the food to the freezer, you are freezing the active microbes in place for the next thawing.
Your best bet is to only thaw food when you are ready to eat it.
Cooking before long-term freezing is also important. Cooking destroys parasites. So cooked food becoming frozen food should not be an issue, unless there was something else going on with the food in the first place. And thawing and re-heating the food in the in the microwave or oven promotes further destruction of some of the unseen creepy crawlies who may have been an issue.
The process is Fresh -> Cook -> Freeze -> Thaw -> Reheat -> Eat
Given this sequence, you should avoid capturing microbes, parasites, microorganisms or any other small unknowns in your food. Make sure you are cooking in a safe environment and frequently wipe surfaces with raw food or juices, and watch the use and re-use of utensils that are handling raw food, clean or change utensils as you cook.
The post-frozen flavor
Frozen food will maintain its taste if it’s frozen when it’s in good condition. We recommend shopping, cooking and freezing as a one day event. Cook the food on the day you buy it, and freeze the same day to maintain freshness and color when it’s defrosted.
Freezing does not destroy nutrients
But there could always be something else going on with the food independent of freezing. So if the food is already deteriorating, freezing does not reverse that process.
Original packaging
You can leave frozen food in its original packaging. Food that is prepared specifically to be frozen should be placed in air-tight freezer safe containers.
Fast vs slow freezing
Freeze immediately after cooking, and try and keep the freezer closed so that the process can be as quick as possible. Depending on the size of the container, the stored food needs two to four hours to freeze, but overnight is a good rule to follow.
Refreezing
You can refreeze food that has thawed in the refrigerator (not at room temperature) or cooked food that was previously frozen.
Power outage
If the power goes out and you do not open the freezer door, you could have about two days before the food begins to go spoil. If the power comes on within that time, again do not open the door as you wait for the food to refreeze. If the power is expected to be out indefinitely, time to start eating. If any of the food is uncooked, start by cooking that first.
Below is the USDA’s Freezer storage chart which is used for quality only meaning the recommended timeframe for eating food where it maintains its original flavor. Cooked frozen food can stay frozen as long as you need.
