The freezer has been around for one hundred years now, and it has changed the way we eat entirely. Freezing food has proven to be the best time saving, food storing, method both in our homes and businesses.
Although frozen food is convenient, not all food is meant to be stored for months, so producers add tons of trans fats, sodium, and god knows what else to keep it colorful and tender. These are the 12 frozen foods that you should avoid at all costs.
#12 – Anything Frozen Twice
Any frozen food: whether you froze it yourself or you picked it up at the supermarket has bacteria. The microorganisms stay inactive in the freezer but will wake up and reproduce as soon as you thaw the food. Thawing and refreezing, cooking and freezing again, these are all opportunities for bacteria to thrive, making food more dangerous to eat. In the right conditions, bacteria can double in number every 20 minutes!
#11 – Ready Meals
Ready meals are just poor quality. Especially the ones that have protein, salad, and carbs in the same plate, they’re not only made with below-standard ingredients, but they’re also aggressively dosed with sodium and food preservatives.
Imagine a huge automatized factory pouring blobs of mashed potatoes and chicken fajitas in endless trays. Trust us; you don’t want that for dinner. Ready meals are also poorly nutritionally balanced; they’re bland too.
#10 – Pasta and rice
Frozen pasta and rice are not only high in sodium and preservatives; they’re just not that tasty. What’s worst, they’re incredibly expensive compared to the cost of making pasta and rice at home. Two staple foods that are not only easy but fast to make, pasta and rice are also a gateway to cook more complicated dishes making them a great way of set a cooking habit in place.
#9 – Fried Goods
Fried foods like pizza bites, onion rings, or fried chicken have dangerous amounts of saturated fat, and they’re just too starchy to be deemed healthy. They might look beautiful on the package photos, but cook them, and you’ll see they’re just soggy and sad.
Fried foods are unhealthy enough; frozen fried foods are the worst thing you can have for dinner. Please do yourself a favor and stay clear of them.
#8 – Marinated Meats
Chicken wings, baby back ribs, or fine-herb chicken breasts; all these marinated meats, so easily found in the supermarket frozen aisles, are filled with chemicals. Meat is injected with saline solutions, and who knows what else to tenderize it. Artificial flavorings are also common. Just look at the back label, how on earth can something so simple have so many ingredients?
#7 – Fish Sticks and Chicken Nuggets
These frozen foods are particularly dangerous because we feed them to our kids. Saturated fats and MSG are always part of the menu, and so are preservatives and flavoring agents. What’s worst, producers use the worst pieces of chicken and fish to make these, undoubtedly tasty, two-biters.
#6 – Frozen Pizza
Pizza is always on the fence between being healthy and being junk food. Traditional, thin pizza is quite healthy, and is part of the Mediterranean diet. The problem is in the doughy, thick pizzas that are more white-flour bread than anything else.
Frozen pizzas are the worst; they have preservatives, MSG, and not the best ingredients around, all over a dubious, calorie-loaded pizza base.
#5 – Smoothie Mix
We all want to eat healthier, and smoothies are not that bad idea. Fresh fruits and veggies, all conveniently blended in a super breakfast you can drink on the go, are healthy, sure. The problem with ready mix smoothies is that they have lots of sugar, gum, preservatives, and not very many ACTUAL fruits. Make smoothies at home with fresh fruit, and add a few greens in there too, but stay clear from frozen smoothie mixes.
#4 – Chicken
Frozen chicken has a dark side, it’s one of the most industrialized products out there; it’s not only not fresh, but it’s bad for you in more ways you can imagine. Chicken meat is often injected with saline solutions and tenderizers to make it juicy and soft. There’s a lot of artificial preservatives involved too. On top of all of this, frozen chicken is way overpriced compared to fresh chicken.
#3 – Burger Patties
The complication with burger patties is that they’re made with low-quality meat and they’re filled with trans fats, and sometimes other hidden ingredients such as starch. Artificial colorings give these patties their bright red color, and they’re drenched in sodium and MSG to make them tasty.
Just cook a homemade burger patty and a frozen one side by side, and you’ll notice there’s something wrong with the store-bough one immediately.
#2 – Cheesecakes
Frozen cheesecakes and pies are immediate and delicious, we can’t deny that, but talk to a pastry chef or a baker, and you’ll realize cakes are pies should not look and taste that way for months, even if frozen.
These are industrialized artificial foods, and there’s nothing natural about them — not the cheese, not the cake. These frozen treats are loaded with sugar too, so the next time you have a special celebration, support a local baker and buy a real cake.
#1 – French Fries
Frozen French fries are the industry standard, even big fast-food chains rely on them, but they’re not very healthy. They’re all starch and salt, and they can have fewer real potatoes than you think. This is a manufactured product that looks like fried potatoes, but they’re something else.
If you still want to enjoy French fries at home, because why shouldn’t you! Make your own in an air fryer, they end up crunchy and delicious, and they have virtually no fat.
Freeze Fresh Food Instead
Frozen food is convenient, and sure, it’s tasty too, but it’s not good for you — it has too many preservatives, fats, and sodium. If you want to maintain the benefits of convenient frozen food, then freeze your own.
Many people cook once a week and freeze individual portions of anything from stews to stir-fries, from cooked pasta to bread. At least you know what’s in the food, and it keeps for weeks or even months. You’ll save tons of money, by the way.
