My wife likes to buy meat from the grocery, then freeze-&-forget it for a few months. What usually happens is that we both forget to defrost the meat during the day, so by the time it’s 7 p.m. or so, it’s “too late to cook the meat”.
What I don’t get is why meat can’t go straight from freezer to overn/stove? My wife insists that it cannot, while I am skeptical.
Take frozen chicken pieces – do they really have to be totally defrosted before making baked chicken? Perhaps playing with the cooking temperatures or times would be required … that I can understand (like starting off on low heat, then raising it later). Surely this is possible, if not ideal?
Or how about frozen packs of ground meat. For making meat sauce for pasta, or something like sloppy joes, why can’t the frozen ground meat go straight into the pan? Keep the spatula moving, start with medium heat, finish with higher heat, and surely it will still brown close to evenly, right?
Can you not microwave the stuff to defrost it? A reasonable hunk of ground meat for maybe 10 minutes at low power should do it. You just want to keep the power low enough to not cook the meat yet.
Other than that, I’d say that baking or frying frozen meat might not work so well, as the outside would thaw and cook while the inside would be frozen and not-cooked. So a chicken that bakes for 30 minutes, the insides might only really cook for 10 or 15. If you’re stewing it for a long-ish time, though, it shouldn’t matter. What it boils down to (pun not intended) is that the inside of each hunk won’t start cooking until the piece has fully thawed. If timing the cooking is important, this is bad. If it really doesn’t matter much whether some parts of the meat stew for two hours while others only get 1h45m, then I don’t see a problem.
'course, if you’re starting to cook at 7pm, chances are it’s not a slow-cooked stew you’re talking about…
You don’t want the outside of the chicken (or whatever) to get overcooked while the inside is still cold & bloody. As for ground meats, I do just what you describe. Remove the cooked part of the meat from the pan as it browns and falls away from the frozen chunk.
Also, reipes are written with thawed meat in mind. Use frozen meat, and the dish won’t turn out right and you’ll blame the recipe rather than the cook.
Our microwave has a Defrost setting. You press “auto defrost” and then enter the suie and type of meat.
Try taking the meat, putting it in the micro and cooking for 45 seconds on 50% power. Take it out and break apart and do it again. Keep doing it until it’s thawed.
You can cook frozen meat. I do it all of the time, but I limit the cooking of it to boiling or slow baking. The exception to this is ground beef. I just toss it in the pan, set the flame on low and cover until it is thawed.
One of the problems that you will get from cooking frozen meat is inconsistency. If say, you BBQ a frozen stake, the outside will be burnt and the inside will be raw. The same goes with chicken. You just don’t eat raw chicken.
Another problem is that as the meat thaws in the pan, juices will be released. This leads to more if a boiling of the meat than frying. Plus it makes the meat a little more dry.
The last problem is more of a convenience issue. The cooking times are much much longer.
If you’re cooking beef steaks, which aren’t hazardous to eat when they’re still rare on the inside, there’s no problem. With chicken, you’d have to overcook the outside to cook the inside to a temperature safe from salmonella. Pork…well, perhaps someone else would like to go through the lively trichinosis debate dance. I don’t feel that energetic right now.
I have grilled frozen thick steaks many times. If you get 'em from Omaha Steaks, the instructions call for it.
I often thaw out chicken breast just before cooking by running water into a dish with the chicken in it for about 10 minutes.
I agree with MrTuffPaws that you can cook frozen meats, but I don’t usually boil or slow-cook.
I always broil or BBQ frozen boneless/skinless chicken breasts. I just rinse them quickly in cold water and baste with marinade and seasonings, then throw 'em in the broiler or on the BBQ. They turn out great: Juicy and delicious.
Dang it – where did I hear this line recently? “Maybe you can give her food poisoning. You made me sick that one time.” “Well, forgive me for making chicken tar-tar.”
With ground beef it’s a good idea to make burger patties before you freeze it and then it’s no problem to cook the burgers frozen. About 4 minutes per side at 375 if the patty is about three-eighth’s inch thick. YMMV.
For chicken pieces (not whole chickens) and steaks, you can put them in a sealed plastic bag, removing as much air as possible, and thaw them in cold water. It shouldn’t take much more than a half hour. Roasts can go straight from freezer to oven, if you use the low-temperature method, and use a meat thermometer to tell when it’s done, rather than just timing it. I’m not sure whether the high-temperature method would work though.
Let’s say you don’t have a microwave, would putting the meat in warm-to-hot water thaw it sufficiently quick ? (I’ve never thawed anything, so please be kind)
I do this with burgers all the time. They don’t shrink when grilled if started frozen. I thought Wendys did this also. Any short order cooks out there, do Wendys burgers go from frozen to cooked?
No. Never thaw meats in warm/hot water. The bacteria LOVE it at that temperature. It’s just hot enough for them to have a “party on the poultry” ( ), but not hot enough to kill the little critters
When I have to quick-thaw meat (we’re of the “dang, forgot to take the chicken out again” class, too ) I do the cold-water method. I actually use a bowl full of ice water, then place a clean pan and a weight on it to keep the meat submerged. One thing I have found is that you need to use a “storage” bag for thawing, not a “freezer” bag - the freezer bags are thicker and make the quick-thawing take a lot longer.
), but not hot enough to kill the little critters 