Frozen food - Brief Insight

A very common sight - an entire row of refrigerators and deep freezers in supermarkets dedicated to storage of frozen foods. This change in the market is due to busy schedule of working class people who cannot often spend time on visiting the supermarkets. Thus, came the concept of preserving food so as to improve its shelf life as well as make non-seasonal foods available anytime to all.

Freezing is the simplest, easiest & quickest way of preserving food stuffs. It does not completely destroy bacteria, molds and yeasts but does significantly retard their growth. Gradually changes in colour, texture, flavour & nutritive value caused by natural enzymes in foods continue.              

At one place where frozen foods are known to have a longer shelf life they are also accompanied with physical and chemical changes.

Freeze drying of food can be done at home as well as commercially. Almost all types of food can be frozen - fruits, vegetables, meats, cooked foods etc., and the essential requirement of freezing being a cold storage or a refrigerator or deep freezer.

Freezing starts from surface of the food and progresses gradually to the core of the product. Preservation is possible because of the greatly reduced water content which inhibits the action of microorganisms and enzymes that would normally spoil or degrade the substance.

Changes that occur during freezing are as in the below diagram:

The process of freezing results in changes in the frozen products:

The main advantages of frozen food are the convenience of storing these foods, their availability throughout different seasons, increased shelf life of the food and preserving food. The various disadvantages of  frozen food are the physical and chemical changes caused in the food due to the process of freezing.

Post by Faiz Lahori