Mining the depths of your personal freezer

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> Mining the depths of your personal freezer

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> Freezing is a popular way to preserve food, but there are rules to

> follow in order to sustain quality and flavor

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> BY JULIA MOSKIN

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> For stalkers of fresh produce, this is a momentous time: It is the

> beginning of the harvest season in much of the United States. For a

> few delirious months, markets will be awash in domestic berries and

> peaches; weeks of plentiful corn and tomatoes will follow.

>

> And then it all ends abruptly in October. Against the long months

> when farm stands are populated exclusively by beets and rutabagas,

> past generations got out their Mason jars and big sterilizing pots

> and canned. But freezing is faster, easier and less sweaty.

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> With summer's bounty and blackouts approaching, here is a basic

> course in freezer management.

>

> Ruthlessness is paramount: A year is the maximum life for most items,

> and a freezer isn't a long-term storage unit.

>

> ''For years, I only saw the back of my freezer when I moved,'' said

> Analisa , a systems analyst who lives in Battery Park City, and

> who was one of several people who revealed the dark secrets of their

> freezers, beet-flavored ice cubes and all. ``The ice cream in the

> front would get eaten, but everything else just stayed.''

>

> Our freezers may dream of labeled and dated cubes of homemade stock,

> but what they seem to get is blackened bananas, stale wedding cake

> and plastic bags crusted over with ice, their contents

> unrecognizable. ''It's amazing how things look alike once they're

> frozen,'' said Chenoweth, a nutritionist in Minneapolis.

>

> In theory, freezing preserves food indefinitely. In fact, for home

> cooks with residential-grade refrigerators, freezing is a stopgap

> that slows the aging of food but does not halt it.

>

> Home freezers should stay well below freezing, at zero or below,

> according to the Agriculture Department. But do you know how cold

> yours is? ''Heavens no,'' Shirley Corriher, a food scientist and the

> author of Cookwise (Morrow, 1997), said from her kitchen in Atlanta

> recently.

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> Most home freezers, especially those inside refrigerators, are at

> least 10 above, the North American Meat Processors Association says.

> And for every 5 degrees above zero, the life of food is cut in half,

> Agriculture Department officials say.

>

> Freezer temperatures can be checked easily with an inexpensive

> refrigerator thermometer from a hardware store or an infrared

> thermometer like the ones the Agriculture Department uses to check

> compliance with food safety rules. Infrared models, which cost $50 or

> more, are useful for checking many temperatures in the kitchen: oil

> for deep-frying, ovens for baking (the thermometers go up to 525) and

> fluctuations in refrigerators and freezers. A sampling of New York

> City home freezers last week, tested with an infrared Raytek MiniTemp

> with a laser pointer, ranged from minus 10 up to 22.

>

> TALKING TEMPERATURE

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> Freezer temperatures should be checked every few months. Even if you

> don't change the setting, a freezer can be 20 degrees warmer in

> summer than in winter. During a blackout like the one last August, a

> home freezer full of food will stay safely frozen for about two days

> if the door is not opened. (A half-full freezer will last about half

> as long, and so on.) Food that has visibly thawed should be used or

> tossed out, but as long as the freezer temperature has not risen

> above 32, the Agriculture Department says, the contents can safely be

> refrozen.

>

> Even food that is frozen under ideal conditions does not last

> forever. ''Most of it can last a few months at the most before the

> taste changes,'' Corriher said. ''As long as it stays at zero, it's

> safe, but that doesn't mean it's going to taste good.'' So taste, not

> just safety, should be a factor when considering what to freeze.

>

> Often, food that has been frozen once can safely be frozen again, an

> important point as ever more people buy their perishables in bulk --

> family packs of chicken parts are one of Costco's biggest-selling

> food items. But by the time you lift these products from the

> refrigerated case, they have already been frozen and thawed at least

> once, so do not expect fresh flavor or succulent texture if you

> refreeze them. The Agriculture Department says it is safe to eat meat

> that has been refrozen, as long as it has never risen above 40

> degrees (refrigerator temperature), even during defrosting.

>

> Chicken, especially, suffers from ''drip,'' the food industry's term

> for the juices that ooze out of food as it thaws. Unappetizing as it

> sounds, drip contains the liquid, salts and minerals that give

> chicken its flavor, and once the thawing releases that liquid, no

> amount of marinating or brining can bring it back.

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> LIFE-SPANS

>

> Chicken, pork and fish are best used within six months; they are far

> less resilient in the freezer than red meats, which can be frozen for

> a year. Anything more than a year old, except large roasts of meat,

> can be considered inedible and thrown out.

>

> Summer fruit and vegetables can last all winter in the freezer,

> especially cooked -- recipes with lots of liquid, like corn chowder,

> tomato sauce, bean soup and berry compote, are ideal. But raw produce

> has a more fragile texture that can be ruined by freezing.

> Vegetables, whether frozen at home or in an industrial plant, can be

> protected by a quick dip in boiling water, to set the texture and

> color. Cut them into bite-size pieces beforehand. They should barely

> cook: The time can range from 90 seconds for spinach and bok choy to

> three minutes for carrots and Jerusalem artichokes. Next, plunge the

> vegetables into a bowl of ice water to stop the cooking. Drain well,

> and freeze.

>

> Fruit should also be cut up before freezing, though berries can be

> left whole. Toss each cup of fruit with a scant tablespoon of sugar

> to reduce browning. (To reduce it more, pack the fruit covered in

> sugar syrup, made by dissolving sugar in an equal quantity of water

> until clear.) Fresh herbs do not freeze well, except stick herbs like

> rosemary and thyme.

>

> When you plot additions to the freezer, remember that stackable

> containers, not bags, are the most efficient storage units. When

> freezing liquids, leave at least half an inch of space at the top of

> each container -- water expands as it freezes. Freezer bags and

> containers are worth the extra cost, because their thickness makes

> them much more airtight than regular plastic products. ''The worst

> thing you can use in the freezer is plain old plastic wrap,''

> Chenoweth said. ``It's like going outside in a snowstorm wearing a

> windbreaker: no protection at all.''

>

> Harold McGee, who explored the chemical processes of the kitchen in

> his book On Food and Cooking, showed that air, even more than age, is

> the enemy of frozen food. Exposure to air dries out the food and

> ultimately causes freezer burn, which, though not a dangerous

> condition, is remarkably unappetizing. Even a small spot usually

> means that the whole piece of food has been exposed to air and will

> taste stale. Thick wrapping, tight seals and snug packing will

> minimize exposure; so will pressing (or sucking) out as much air as

> possible before sealing any freezer container.

>

> Defrosting is one of the great and irritating challenges of cooking

> from the freezer. For many staples, the process cannot be rushed, so

> planning is necessary. Frozen fruits, fresh pasta and blanched

> vegetables can be cooked straight from the freezer. (One faction of

> grilling radicals even insists that burgers and steak can be cooked

> frozen, if they are not more than about an inch thick.) But ''if you

> need chicken right away, you are pretty much out of luck,'' Corriher

> said. ``I find that microwave defrosting is risky: Some parts start

> cooking while the rest of it is still ice.''

>

> The Agriculture Department insists that for safe defrosting, food

> must be thawed slowly in the refrigerator, or while tightly wrapped

> and immersed in cold water. (Microwave defrosting is so variable that

> the department does not offer guidelines, other than to specify that

> microwave-defrosted food should be cooked immediately.) A 15-pound

> turkey, for example, will take three days to thaw fully in the

> refrigerator, but leaving the turkey at room temperature for a few

> hours is not an option. ''Any time you leave food out on the

> counter,'' Corriher said, ``the microbiologists just go crazy.''

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