I hope this is in the right forum, if not mods, please do that thing you do so well.
I had a box of canned goods sit in the trunk of the car for a month, probably going through several freeze/thaw cycles. Also a bottle of wine… a non oaked Chardonnay, if that matters. The wine is in slushy form, cork came out. (Interestingly the bottle of beer is unfrozen.
So I want to know, should I pitch out the canned goods? Since most of the cans were beans… should I make an enormous batch of chili? Should I open the cans now and put the contents into freezer bags and keep them frozen solid? Theres kidney beans, lentils, black beans, chickpeas and good old baked beans. Also some canned pears and fruit cocktail, a few creamed soups. Two cans of tuna.
And also, dont forget what should I do with the wine? I have to work tomorrow so a yummy freezy punch thing isnt going to happen tonight, but should I keep it frozen for such a concoction, or let it thaw, drink it and hope for the best. Or again, treat the drains to a nightcap?
No one has a suggestion or knows if the food is still edible?
well, I did this to a couple cans of potatoes (freeze/thaw cycles) and they were completely destroyed by it. You might think nothing can destroy canned potatoes, and in a way you are right – they were still food, per se. but the freezing exploded a lot of the cells, leaving a sort of tough, tasteless pulp that was at once mushy and chewy. Gross and I mean gross. I opened the can thinking it would be okay to toss in a stew but there was NO WAY I would serve it unless I was literally starving.
You might as well open the cans at this point and see what you have. At the very least the texture will be copromised by freezing/thawing. If anything is edible make a big chili, ham-bean soup, or some other dish that is strongly flavored and “cooks down” the beans. I’d wager that everything is inedible at this point though.
I think the wine would be okay if the seal was intact (Martha Stewart recommends freezing wine in chunks for cooking purposes where you only need a couple tablespoons). However the fact that the seal is open makes me think it might have gotten vinegary or yeast-infected. Was the bottle exposed to open air – ie cork completely out, so particles could fall in?
I forgot to add:
Canned soups – probably fine, any chunks might have an odd texture but everything is basically puree to start with.
Canned pears – probably pulped in the can like my potatoes. You might be able to make a pear sauce (tasty on pancakes) by blending the whole lot (syrup and all). ditto on the fruit cocktail, except fruit cocktail sauce sounds disgusting. Might be okay as a filling in a jelly roll (that’s a lot of effort to save a can of fruit cocktail though)
Tuna – no idea. Open it and see. If loss of texture but flavor fine, use in tuna casserole.
The wine should be fine for cooking but it may be cloudy and unpleasant to look at if your drinking it. best bet with the food would be to open them and see how they are. If you can, make them into some sort of puree. The chickpeas could be made into hummus, the beans into refried beans and the fruit into some sort of sauce or jam.
Thanks for the replies. It stuck me later today why do I care about saving the tinned beans anyway? the total was oh maybe 15 dollars of canned goods, lets see I think I can survive without. I guess I have inherited some Depression Era mentality about not wasting food. That or my 3 months on welfare/foodbanks. Everything is a little less firm and the liquid is a little murky, ie some of the beans split but everything seems fine. Beans Im keeping, fruit Im keeping, but the tuna and things…out they go.