I have been buying Bush Pinto Beans in the bulk cans for years. I eat them everyday. Because, It takes me about 7-10 days to go through an entire bulk can. So, I just recently started portioning the bulk cans out into little plastic ziploc bags that I store in a larger container in a mini-fridge with a very small top freezer.
For the past week or so I thought I had finally figured out the best way to save money on my meals and do it in a healthy way. After today, it seems the challenge is still upon me.
For about the past 3 days I've been pulling a ziploc bag out of my larger container from the freezer for dinner and cooking the beans from a fairly frozen state. Well, the beans end up breaking down into a mush.
Today, I decided to pull a frozen bag out of the freezer about 4 hours before dinner and put it in the refrigerated portion of my mini-fridge. I know better than to thaw at room temperature.
To my surprise, the bag I was going to pull out was already thawed. And I said to myself, what's going on? Is my refrigerator broken? Well, I think my refrigerator is working very well but it's going through defrosting phases.
So, behind my back, my frozen ziploc bags of beans are, apparently being thawed and re-frozen, for all I know, on a daily basis.
Learning this today just makes me want to give up sometimes. No matter, how hard you try to be safe, something is always going to get you.
Having the beans thaw/freeze/thaw/freeze on a daily basis cannot be safe, can it?
I've eaten spoiled beans before, yes knowingly because I didn't want to waste them. And I'll probably do the same since I only have 2 ziploc bags left. But I'm not stupid enough to continue doing this.
Can someone let me know if I am overreacting on this? I plan to use a larger upright freezer that doesn't go through these thawing cycles, or do they? I just don't know.