Freezer door left open

corblimey

So I unknowingly left my freezer door open last night and everything thawed. I closed it this morning, but I suspect most of the contents will need to go in the bin. Can anyone confirm which of the following I shouldn't touch even though they're refrozen by now?

1. Raw meat (steak, chicken)
2. Cooked meat (for example shepherds pie, chicken curry)
3. Bread (burger buns, sliced pans, wraps)
4. Pre-frozen food (for example birds eye burgers, frozen chips, etc)
5. Raw fruit & veg

I think everything except the raw meat should be fine (the chips will probably be all fused together, but should still be edible)?

I would've taken out as much as I could and eat it this weekend, except I leave for Europe in the morning so I just closed the door and will deal with the fallout this evening, but a list of what can usually be safely thawed and refrozen would be handy.

olaola

I defo wouldn't go near the meat again.
I'd say the bread etc might not taste so great defrosted again.

Dizzyblonde

As far as I'm aware the only thing that's safe to refreeze is bread. I've read posts saying it's safe to refreeze meat but that it doesn't taste the same after - I wouldn't chance it myself though.
You'd probably have been better not to close the door this morning and put stuff in the fridge. Then you could have eaten a lot of it over the next couple of days.

Faith

It's only safe to refreeze meat if it was defrosted in the fridge. OP, throw out any meat products at all (including the cooked meals). The bread should be fine, as should the chips. The texture of the fruit and veg may be destroyed though.

rubadub

corblimey wrote: »

but a list of what can usually be safely thawed and refrozen would be handy.

Raw meat can be SAFELY thawed and refrozen as many times as you like. The key word is safely. There are myths about bacteria forming and warnings on packets not to refreeze. This is since the water expands and alters the cell structure, mushrooms turn to mush if frozen normally and defrosted. Meat will tasted different as said above. The fruit & veg will probably go to mush upon mulitple freeze/thaw cycles too.

Companies warn against it since they do not want you eating weird tasting food and thinking it is their normal product.

If the food defrosted and then was above normal fridge temps then it is not safe. Food should be defrosted in the fridge to be safest.

If in doubt, throw it out.

the beer revolu

with reference to what has been said above about safely defrosting meat;

I would suggest that a freezer with its door left open overnight would never reach a temperature higher that a fridge.
Think about it. It would have been at -20. I assume that the door was only ajar and not wide open. The freezer was still switched on.
I'd guess that any where at the back/bottom (upright or chest freezer) would have remained frozen and anywhere near the top/front would be highly unlikely to have gotten anywhere near +5 (fridge temp).

I wouldn't throw anything out - but that's me!