Over the last decade or so I have noticed that the quality of store-bought frozen meals has increased. And after heating, the quality of the frozen food is better than my own prepared meals that I freeze and reheat later. Vegetables, while usually not exactly crisp, are far less mushy than my leftovers even if they're vacuum-sealed. Pasta is pretty tender, sauces are pretty flavorful, and in pretty much every way my leftovers are outclassed after any length of time in the freezer.
As I understand, there is a fair bit involved in preparing those frozen meals at the factory but the most important element is rapid freezing in an extremely low-temperature freezer.
I recently saw a listing for a blast chiller small enough that it might reasonably fit in a residential kitchen, which led me to wonder: could I prepare food, freeze it in the blast chiller, and then heat it later, essentially making my own frozen meals with quality comparable to the mass-produced frozen meals available today?
For reference, here is a link to the type of frozen meal I'm describing (this is not intended to be an endorsement of or advertisement for this brand). Even if it worked as I imagine I'm not convinced that this is an economical practice for a home cook, but I am interested enough in whether or not it would work and if the flash-frozen food would last longer (or be more palatable for longer) than conventionally frozen leftover food.
Best Answer
Supermarket frozen food is not leftovers.
Aside from the fact that some things freeze well - chilli is almost impossible to break - & some things freeze badly … don't freeze leftover risotto, it is not a joyous reheat candidate … I think the significant difference is not in how fast they're frozen, but in the preparation method itself.
Supermarket chilled & frozen food is not leftovers, it's specifically cooked to be able to survive that last 15 mins in the oven or 3 mins in the nukerowave.
Pasta isn't cooked to be edible in the factory, it's cooked to be edible after having been chilled, then had some cold, half-cooked sauce dribbled over it, stored for 6 weeks, then nuked to death.
Rice, for instance, whether 'Chinese fried', 'Indian byriani', or 'Uncle Ben's plain boiled' never sticks because it was par-cooked (likely from already polished quick rice, then chilled & surface-dried whilst being separated further (see any online fried rice recipes for how this works to separate the grains) & not until then mixed with whatever 'chunks' or sauce are required for the final dish.
This then has been cold for most of its life already. It wasn't made to eat now.
Vegetables will be given little more than a par-boil (or microwave) so that they don't fall apart by the time they're married to whatever sauce. They're not fully cooked until the consumer has finished heating them. Can you even imagine giving garden peas an extra 5 mins in boiling water… no, so they won't even go in heated at all, they'll just go in raw, cooked only by you.
So, in short, your chilli will never need that kind of care & attention; your delicate broccoli florets will not survive having first been cooked sufficiently to eat.
Personally, I portion & freeze things that freeze well with no special requirements. Chilli, curries, stews are all completely unaffected by 3 months in the freezer (if they ever last me that long). Raw burgers, if a little more likely to get surface water whilst cooking don't suffer much. Pasta, no; rice, no (unless it was a 'dry' rice, plain boiled or similar, never in any kind of sauce) pastry, only uncooked… etc.
One thing I would say, as a home cook with nothing but "life experience" to tell me all this is…
"if it will freeze for a week, it will freeze for 6 months"
This is not a health recommendation, merely a guide as to what will ruin by the time it's frozen compared to what is indestructible. Compare frozen chilli to frozen beansprouts for a lesson you could learn in 24 hours ;)
(I realised I cannot comment on supermarket sauces, as I've never really found any that aren't just as bland as all heck compared to home-cooked.)