Defrosting food: Some facts, tips to know

As people shift gears from perusing which restaurant to visit to peering into their freezer to see what’s available, the rules of defrosting become imperative to follow.

It’s not as simple as merely taking out a frozen bag of whatever and letting it sit on the counter. That act can become a recipe for disaster. Improper defrosting runs the risk of botulism or the bacteria listeria.

Tim McCoy, education director at the International Culinary Arts and Sciences Institute in Geauga County, agrees the best option is to defrost items in a refrigerator to avoid what he calls “danger-zone temperatures.” That’s a range of 41 to 135 degrees.

McCoy — who is a ServSafe teacher and instructs on proper food-sanitation methods — says there are four ways to defrost:

1. “The best option is to do it in a refrigerator,” McCoy said. This temperature-controlled method is preferred.

Chef Ky-Wai Wong of Cuyahoga Community College’s Hospitality Management Center agreed. “The safest way to defrost something is to put it in your fridge,” he said.

2. “If you’re going to defrost it in water, you can’t just plunk it in a bowl of water,” McCoy said. “It’s got to be running water. The idea there is if you have any kinds of juices or bits of food, the running water will kind of wash it away. That water is not allowed to be over 70 degrees, and the food should never go over 41 degrees.”

Running frozen food under cold running water is a defrosting technique, but not for more than two hours, Wong said.

3. Defrost as part of the cooking process. For example, if you have a frozen burger, go from freezer to pan. “That’s a tip I give to all my neighbors when we have block parties,” he said.

Wong said the same thing. If you are making a stew or soup, the frozen block can be put directly into a pot with a lid on it, he said.

4. Understand microwaving. “If you defrost something in the microwave you have to cook it completely by conventional cooking means immediately after defrosting it in a microwave because microwaves don’t defrost evenly,” McCoy said. “So when it’s in a microwave you may have some parts of it that are cooked and some parts of it that are not cooked.”

Wong added key defrosting tips. “For food safety, if you have fish or meat vacuum-packed, take it out of the vacuum pack before defrosting,” he said. “Even if you put in the fridge.”

Wong suggested taking food out of its packaging to “let it breathe.”

“Open it up,” he said. “Whether you put it in the fridge or water or microwave. Listeria is a big one that can mess you up.”

And important: Once your food is defrosted, cook it right away.