Cooking before freezing?
- lightdeprived
- Vickiemc
- mitchmom385
- Lvforests
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» lightdeprived - My daughter is scaring me
My daughter, a young mother, has recently taken up OAMC and is doing something I feel quite sure is unsafe, but I can't find much info on it. To save time on her cooking day she is assembling and freezing entrees without cooking them first. Usually instructions for freezing entrees specify fully cooking, or at least cooking to the halfway point. Rarely have I seen instructions to do what she is doing. As far as the "whys" of this, I can find little info, aside from the usual warnings about eggs, mayonnaise, etc. I have consulted numerous books.When I was at her house recently I saw an example that alarmed me. She took a pan of uncooked stuffed cabbage rolls out of her freezer and put them in the oven. No matter how long she cooked them, the ground beef stayed red. To be sure they were fully cooked we baked them again - still red inside.
Does anyone know what is going on with this? They tasted fine and no one got sick, but they certainly looked unappetizing, and everyone worried about what they were eating.
Thanks for any information you can give me.
-- posted by lightdeprived
» Vickiemc - Uncooked frozen directly to oven?
I'm going to let the editor of Freezer Cooking give her own answer, but I'll tell you what I think is wrong with what she's doing.First, if she'assemblyingng foods with raw meat ingredients the meat is at room temperature as she's doing the work. While the meat is at room temp it's a great breeding ground for bacteria. She should keep the assembly time as short as possible.
Second, by taking the food directly from the freezer and putting it in the oven, she's increasing the time that the food is in the "danger zone" (temps more than 40F and less than 140F, where bacteria grow at a tremendous rate). If the food is defrosted in the refrigerator before it is baked, it will cook more quickly and spend less time in that danger zone.
As you can imagine, the two above, combined, very much increases the risk of food born illness.
In addition, by not browning her meats before assembling them for baking (for things such as stuffed cabblasagne lasagne, enchiladas, raw-meat casseroles) she's missing out on all the great flavors created by cooking the meat first. Browning meats carmelizationlization, which is pure flavor.
I believe that the pink phenomenon comes from the lack of direct heat on the meat. You don't even want to know how they treat ground beef to keep it looking nice and fresh under that nice plastic wrap. We'll save that for another disVickien.
Vickie
-- posted by Vickiemc
» mitchmom385 - Re: Uncooked frozen directly to oven?
In response to Uncooked frozen directly to oven? posted by Vickiemc:I recently went to a Power Cooking demo for Pampered Chef and what they show seems to work very well. If you are using chicken, you can use unfrozen (fresh) to put in your meals then freeze them. To cook, you should thaw them for 24 hours in your refrigerator before cooking.
You are right about the ground beef. I never, ever, freeze ground beef in a meal such as this because of the chance of bacteria growing in the ground meat. If you are using sliced beef, this is different and you can thaw as mentioned above.
I'm pretty new to the freezing meals and making several at one time but I have been doing this in small portions for years.
-- posted by mitchmom385
» Lvforests - Re: Uncooked frozen directly to oven?
Ground beef is safe if it is used in a recipe and then frozen and cooked later. Or if cooked ground beef is used in a recipe and then frozen, it is also safe.The only time that it would not be safe would be if it was not cooked completely.
-- posted by Lvforests
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