Should a sous-vide-cooked meat be frozen then reheated

porksous-vide

New to sous-vide, I was wondering, once you are done cooking, will it degrade the quality of the meat if I freeze it then reheat it back? The method of reheating probably matters, but let's say I am gonna re-sous-vide it back to eating temp. Also, this is for pork if it's relevant.

Best Answer

This shouldn't be a problem. What I recommend is to go in this order:

  1. Don't pre-salt the food, other seasonings are fine but anything with a high sodium content should be left out
  2. Cook to your desired temp (and I would recommend pasteurizing since it's not a direct serve situation
  3. Pull food from bath and plunge immediately into an ice bath filled about half and half with cold water and ice to rapidly drop the temp of the food
  4. Once chilled, put in freezer to store, leave them directly in the bag your cooking with. If your using ziplocks I would suggest wrapping them in plastic wrap and then putting them back in the ziplock before freezing.
  5. When it's time to reheat, repeat your sous vide process from the initial cook. It will take the same amount of time it initially took to bring the core up to temp + the time it will take to unthaw the food in the bath. Reheating direct from frozen is your best bet for quality.
  6. Post-sear the food and add salt at that point. Adding salt at this point will prevent the food from taking on a cured texture when it is frozen and held for a period of time.
  7. Enjoy!
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