Freezing Food Fail

[ReadWriteLearnLove]

Many times when I cook I end up making enough to feed a small army, so I've gotten into the habit of freezing half of what I prepare for a future meal. Mostly I've had great success and it makes our busy weeknights a little less hectic. Last month, on December 15th to be exact (because I always put the date on the container when I freeze food), I made a huge pot of chicken rice soup. Yesterday, my husband grabbed one of the frozen containers of soup to bring for lunch. Somehow that soup was not ideal for freezing and he ended up with the worst stomachache of his life after eating only a couple bites. Yikes! I feel terrible about it, but I'm not sure where I went wrong. I've made other chicken meals that have lasted much more than a couple weeks in the freezer.

Does anyone have any tips or suggestions that might help me avoid poisoning my husband in the future? I kinda like him and want to keep him around for awhile

 

[SatNavSaysStraightOn]

It was probably the rice rather than the chicken. If it is not reheated very carefully after freezing it can cause big problems. It may well have not been brought up to a high enough temperature for long enough before eating, something I have to nag my husband about time and time again. Rehearing rice is fine if certain conditions are met, but slowly and not to boiling point and not for long enough are not good combinations when it comes to rice.

But the truth is unless both of you are ate it and both of you got ill, you won't know for definite that it was even the food he ate that was the problem or that it was that particular meal in question.

 

[Ella]

I always find when reheating things you can get a bit lazy and you do need to stop stir and put it back in the microwave. I know I have cheated and thought lukewarm was fine and then ate it and that's the danger. It's always better to have it steaming hot and let it cool down than eat lukewarm and get ill. I think this may have been the case, usually food is not reheated long enough equals upset tummy.

 

[OhioTom76]

I've heard about rice not being safe to freeze and re-heat too many times in the past, but I don't recall the specifics of it. I believe I was doing some research to see if there was a way to make large batches of rice and freeze individual portions for future use and someone advised against doing that because it could make you sick. I think the issue in particular is when you try to freeze and reheat leftovers, not necessarily if you cook the rice specifically for freezing - but don't quote me on that.

Another possible issue was that perhaps you didn't let the soup cool completely before freezing it? I've always been told to never freeze hot food directly. You should always let it cool first before putting it in the freezer. I guess it has something to do with the food remaining at an unsafe temperature for too long as it transitions from hot to cold in the freezer, causing bacteria and other bad stuff to form.

 

[Mockingbird]

I think because I have some restaurant experience, I am a bit different in the way I approach freezing food. It seems you can lose something if you freeze the wrong type of food product, for chicken I only freeze chicken base broth and actual cooked chicken if I plan to use it very soon. Chicken does not seem to be able to handle long term freezing, it always gets weird. Vegetables, uncooked meats and some berries freeze well. You can also freeze quite a few pasta recipes, lasagna freezes very nice if you wrap it individually.

Also I agree about the re-heating, if you a purposely freezing something for later use, maybe you can cook it a bit less so when you re-heat the food will not dry out and be overcooked. I usually do not microwave any food that was frozen, I feel like the microwave does not cook evenly.

 

[DIna00]

You can also freeze quite a few pasta recipes, lasagna freezes very nice if you wrap it individually.
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How do you freeze pasta recipes? Do you mean before the noodles are cooked, or you can freeze them after they are cooked? I get lasagna, but how would you go about freezing other pasta recipes? And how would you then reheat them best?

This is something I want to learn more about, all my freezing attempts are usually a big fail or mediocre at best. Especially chicken, you are right it does go weird, like stringy or something.