Less handy, however, is the thawing process, which often requires planning a day or more ahead of the cooking. Food thaws slowly in the refrigerator, especially when kept in its plastic packaging, which is the method recommended by purveyors and the Department of Agriculture to minimize bacterial growth and the loss of juices. Thawing in cold water, 40 degrees or below, is safe and much faster — water transfers heat far more efficiently than air — but it can still take hours.
Now there’s good news for last-minute cooks. It turns out that you can thaw frozen steaks and other compact cuts in as little as 10 minutes, without compromising their quality, and with very little effort. All you need is hot water.This information comes, surprisingly, from research sponsored by the Department of Agriculture, though the methods aren’t yet officially recommended. The studies have been published in the Journal of Food Science and in Food Control.
At the U.S.D.A. labs in Beltsville, Md., Janet S. Eastridge and Brian C. Bowker test-thawed more than 200 one-inch-thick beef strip loin steaks in three different groups: some in a refrigerator at 37 to 40 degrees Fahrenheit, some in a constantly circulating water bath at 68 degrees, and some in a water bath at 102 degrees.
Air-thawing in the refrigerator took 18 to 20 hours, while the room-temperature water bath thawed the steaks in about 20 minutes, and the hot-summer-day bath in 11 minutes. These water-bath times are so short that any bacterial growth would remain within safe limits.
The water-thawed steaks actually leaked less juice than the air-thawed steaks. The researchers grilled the steaks, too, and found that all the thawed steaks lost about 26 percent of their original weight once cooked, while never-frozen steaks lost 21 percent. The study found no significant differences in tenderness between slow- and quick-thawed steaks.