Help! Freezer woes

beer2006

Just wondered if you could help.

Our freezer has gone off and everything in it defrosted. That was yesterday. Everything was still quite cold, but we think it has been off for about 5 days.

The idea was to roast everything we could today and eat it for the rest of the week or freeze it cooked. To keep the food cold we turned on the freezer for a little while, but.....DOH!!! forgot to turn it off over night and now everything is frozen again.

Help, what can we do. Do we defrost it and cook it or leave it frozen and eat when we want it, or should we just chuck it, (sobbing quietly)

Any advice greatly appreciated.

Theres chickens and venison roasts in there.

annie-c

Aaagh!

I had a similar problem recently, but the food had only been defrosting less than 24hrs. I found the following US guide useful:

http://www.fsis.usda.gov/OA/pubs/facts_basics.pdf

which basically said that meat defrosted in the fridge can be refrozen, but not otherwise. It's a judgement call as to whether your food was as cold as fridge temperatures - mine was so I kept most of it, but threw out the chicken as I was more worried about salmonella than about wasting money.

Aside from the meat/fish, I threw out some veggies that looked vile and ice-cream because I had read somewhere that bacteria multiplies really quickly in refrozen ice-cream.

Really sorry to hear about your accident...... good luck!

Annie

Queenie

Once raw frozen food has defrosted it shouldn't be refrozen in it's raw state.

Sadly, for your own health sake, it means you should throw it all away and put it down to experience

beer2006

Thankyou for your quick replys.

It was kept as cold as a fridge, but we will throw away everything else apart from the venison, it was cheap, but are 3 really expensive joints if we got them at a shop.

janb5

Have a look at your domestic insurance to see if you are covered.I was a bit confused when you said the freezer broke but then you got it working again.

leesmithg

beer2006 wrote:

Just wondered if you could help.

Our freezer has gone off and everything in it defrosted. That was yesterday. Everything was still quite cold, but we think it has been off for about 5 days.

The idea was to roast everything we could today and eat it for the rest of the week or freeze it cooked. To keep the food cold we turned on the freezer for a little while, but.....DOH!!! forgot to turn it off over night and now everything is frozen again.

Help, what can we do. Do we defrost it and cook it or leave it frozen and eat when we want it, or should we just chuck it, (sobbing quietly)

Any advice greatly appreciated.

Theres chickens and venison roasts in there.

Have you checked the fuse?

2 years ago my chest freezer decided to defrost and the 13 amp fuse was knackered.

Changed fuse and it works fine now.

Something about freezers and fuses going broke quick, I swear it's a conspiricy between freezer makers and selling freezer insurance.

beer2006

Ahhh no no no

I ahem, umm, turned it off by accident, while I was moving a pile of work stuff, in front of the switch. It was very early in the morning and I didn't notice.
Also its in the garage, so it doesn't got visited all the time.

Its not worth claiming on the insurance, not enough in it.

leesmithg

beer2006 wrote:

Ahhh no no no

I ahem, umm, turned it off by accident, while I was moving a pile of work stuff, in front of the switch. It was very early in the morning and I didn't notice.
Also its in the garage, so it doesn't got visited all the time.

Its not worth claiming on the insurance, not enough in it.

Ohhhhhhhhhhhhh Ohhh IC