quick question please re freezing/re-freezing

[mckenzie]

This morning I defrosted some steak mince to make a Spaghetti bolognese for dinner and there is some of the mince/bolognese sauce left. Can I frezze this even though the mince was frozen before it was cooked?
Is there a general ruling for freezing and re-freezing?

Alternatively, if I cool it properly, how long will it keep in the fridge for?

I only got into cooking last year when i started to wean our DS and I often have daft questions like these. IS there a book than anyone could recommend, an 'Idiots guide to food hygiene' perhaps?

Mckenzie I dont think you can freeze it again after cooking. I would keep it a couple of days in the fridge. I tend to feel that things that have been frozen can't last so long in the fridge but that may be overcautious. Anyway in our house dh tends to eat up all leftovers for lujch (he works from home) so the problem rarely exists! hth

lunch

DS is with his Grandma tomorrow but he willhappily eat it on friday. So it should be okay in the fridge until then do you think? I'll be sure to heat it through very thoroughly.

Oh dear - I always refreeze if it it's been cooked in the meantime (like frozen chicken cooked into a casserole and then refrozen). I assumed it was okay because it was cooked in the meantime. What I thought was bad was if you defrosted something then refroze without cooking or after you'd only reheated (wouldn't be hot enough to kill the bugs).

Going to try and look it up now...

I would happily do that Mckenzie.

I found this confusing - I have checked it again in Annabel Karmel's book, Feeding your baby and toddler, and it says "Defrosted raw food may be cooked and then frozen again for later use, but any other food that has thawed should never be refrozen". So you could re-freeze your bolognese sauce. This book has a few pages on food hygiene, freezing etc.

I tend to use up leftovers in the fridge within 24 hours for the kids, but might give it 48 hours for me or dh - no ill effects yet!!

Thank you for finding that Caroline - I had a brief panic then

The advice from my ex-boss (microbiologist in a food lab) backs up AK - you can refreeze only if the 1st time the item was raw and 2nd time cooked.

The problems arise if the food isnt properly defrosted and reheated after the 2nd freezing - the tendency is that because it is only reheating, not cooking, to not be as thorough about ensuring it is really hot all the way through.

thanks all.
I've got the Annabel Karmel book Caroline5 but stupidly didn't think to look in there. I think i'll go with her advice and freeze it then
(I like Ms Karmel as she says that if you can get your child to eat liver then you are a good mother. Absolutely daft comment but as my DS loves liver I think she's quite right!!)

(that makes me a terrible mother then ... the smell of cooking liver makes me heave so ds has only had it once... and even then dh had to cook it!).

Ah ... found the government site about food safety - loads of stuff about various aspects but the freezing bit is here:

Food Standards Agency

thanks GeorginaA, I'm going to take a look now.