Not sure where to post this but...

Anyone have tips on keeping frozen food frozen during a power outage? I have like 20 lbs of hanger steaks, short ribs and other assorted goodies I would hate to lose in this PNW windstorm. I live on top of a hill north of Seattle and seem to lose power when 3 or more people fart at the same time...sooooooo, pretty sure it's gonna happen this weekend.

Thanks community.

Find more posts tagged with

What About Tools?

Comments

Brandon_Byrd_40557

Stick it in a cooler and put dry ice (wrapped in newspaper) on top. I moved halfway across the country this summer and moved the contents of my freezer this way. Airgas has a dry ice locator that's pretty handy. Looks like there are a ton of locations in the Seattle area.

Jeremy_131558

Oh yeah. That's a good idea. The Fred Meyer up the street has some. Thanks pal!

wolfiegirl

I live in Houston, the gulf coast area of east Texas so we're no strangers to flooding, hurricanes snd other fun stuff (cough). I've got three freezers that include a small upper freezer above our beer/soda fridge, a freezer drawer in the kitchen fridge and finally the upright deep freeze. We've been through all sorts of bad weather and other crap where the electrics went away for more than a day and a half before we were back to normal, at least electrically speaking. That being said the first thing to do is keep the freezer door closed. Don't open it or do anything to let that cold air escape. The meats will be okay for a reasonable length of time (24-36 hours). If you have room, you can add time to that by having dry ice, blocks of ice you made in advance and/or freezer packs you would use in a cooler. Most times the power is out for hours, not days, so as long as you leave the freezer closed (no peeking!!) You should be fine but.

By your post you anticipate a power outage so get a few containers, fill them 3/4's of the way full of water and place them between the items in your freezer now for a little insurance.

Good luck!!

Jeremy_131558

I have a few old bags of ice in there. It's a chest freezer that is pretty full, I read that helps as well. maybe I'll do ice blocks for the rest of the freezer and dry ice for the most important stuff. Hah

wolfiegirl

You're right....a more full freezer will stay frozen longer than a half-empty one. Sounds like you're pretty well set with the extra bags of ice. Key to the whole thing is to keep the freezer closed. So if there's anything you want to cook this weekend, now would be the time to pull it out!

Brandon_Byrd_40557

Since you've got a chest freezer, the simplest thing to do would be to just use that as the cooler and plop a couple slabs of dry ice on top of what's in there. But like Byrdie said, I doubt that your power will be out for long enough for this to be a big issue. If the power's just going to be out for just a few hours (or even up to a day) keep the freezer shut and you'll be fine. Especially since it's mostly full.

Jeremy_131558

That's what I figured. I have the inside freezer to feast my way through if it comes to it! I need a sous vide that runs off a/c in my car. Hah

fisher23

Dry ice is best, get it soon or it will be too late as it will all be gone. I'm over in the Spokane area and we have had outages lasting 4 to 5 days. Last time when we had some warning, I got two bags probably 20 lbs. It lasted for almost the entire time. Prior to that we had a couple of times it went out for a day or so, no problem with anything below the first few inches, so put your expensive meat in the bottom. I finally broke down and bought a generator. Good luck and be safe. You are going to get hit harder than us this time.

Eric_So_267001

If dry ice isn't available, we've filled our freezer as much as possible and if there's room, we either fill jugs with fresh water or bags with fresh water. Basically, we do whatever we can to keep the freezer as filled as possible.. and with as dense items as possible. We also take out the icemaker and fill that much space as well.

To tell how far thawed things have gone, I put a penny on top of an ice cube.

Jeremy_131558

So far so good! Weather service overestimated first storm it seems. Dry ice is first thing on the menu this morn and after the storm I will fizzify 2lbs of grapes!

wolfiegirl

A generator is really the only 'sure' thing for the long haul.

gabor.szeder

You could freeze brine instead of plain water to fill up freezer space.

Melting ice takes up much more energy than warming ice, and as salts lower the melting point, it will take up that energy at a lower temp, where your frozen goods are still, well, frozen, keeping them that way longer.

rarmet

I've had power go out for a full 24 hours before. If you've got enough in your freezer and you aren't opening it constantly everything should remain frozen for that period of time.
Did fine me for

Jeremy_131558

Yeah I had about 19 hours last year with no issues but the news was hyping this group of storms up like crazy. So I was prepping for multiple days. Haha. Silly news.

matthomas14

https://youtu.be/5nuUn18n5FU

Jeremy_131558

Wellllllll...that was uneventful. Thanks for the tips everyone! I'll use them in the future! All my fellow Washingtonians, how did you fair?