Feeding and storing defrosted frozen foods

[maroun.c]

I daily defrost one days feed. For some foods that thaw and release a smelly dirty liquid I rinse in an Artemia sieve and feed after. For LRS and we mysis that usually have needed small particles or are cleaner I don't rinse.

 

[maroun.c]

I also don't soak frozen in vitamins or meds unless fosh aint eating pellets at frozen food doesn't absorb as much as pellets and flakes do.

 

[vetteguy53081]

Surprised at the responses for 2-3 days. I have a small solo cup and add an ounce of RO water and add food portion with either vitamins or garlic and feed (3 tanks) until gone. I have broken too big of a piece and placed in fridge for next day and the discoloration and smell was not worth it

 

[PhreeByrd]

I've never thawed more food than I need for a single feeding. I normally use frozen cubes, and thaw them in a small beaker, in enough pure water to cover the cubes. I don't really rinse. After the food is thawed in about 15 minutes, I pour off the liquid and add enough water to make it all pour easily and then add it to the display. Done. Usually there is still quite a bit of small stuff in the food, which the fish typically ignore, but the corals take care of. I don't have issues with high nutrients, although I don't try to run low-nutrient systems.

 

[Ksmmike]

I take a small amount of water from my tank and defrost one cube and sometimes two. I will at times defrost one cube of bloodworms with one cube of mysis. I usually feed them about half if I defrost 2 cubes and save some for the next day. If I only do one cube then I feed it all at once. I do that because I have one clown who doesn't like worms too much and one wrasse that wont usually wont touch the shrimp but loves the worms.

Oh and I don't pour the water back into the tank. I remove the shrimp and worms from the water.

 

[salty joe]

I use a small container with rodi water to store defrosted food in the fridge a week at a time. I use LRS and been doing it for years with no I'll effects

Glad to see that. I plan on setting up a self purging automatic feeder for thawed frozen food and was planning a weekly cleaning. I'll keep the mini fridge just above the freezing point for the fish food, I'm guessing around 30F.

 

[furyofthegnomes]

I will go two to three days with the food. I break off a piece of reef frenzy and thaw it with some tank water in a little glass container. I end up using most of the food that day usually so on the second day I'll top off what's left with something different, usually a cube of one of the hikari foods or mysis. This way my fish and coral are getting a lot of different foods. I've never noticed any problems going as long as three days.

 

[clicfacil]

I only defrost what I need for that feeding.

 

[eggplantparrot]

What if you have small tank and the fishies cant finish a whole cube? I usually dump the rest in my FW tank as they will eat everything but sometimes its still too much. But i only keep the thawed stuff for 24 hr atost with RODI.

 

[jabberwock]

Here is a curveball... I have a 32 gallon biocube, so I feed 1/4 of a mysis cube per day. I supplement with some pellets. I thaw an entire cube and drain (not rinse) off the excess liquid. Then I portion it into 4 small solo cups with lids, and refreeze three of them. Feed the fourth, and re-thaw the other three one at a time daily for the next few days. I just set the cup on the lid of the cube and it thaws in about three minutes. This works particularly well when I am out of town, and someone else is in charge of feeding. I can set up a week's worth of instant dinners very easily.

I found jello shooter cups at the grocery store. I reuse them a bunch of times, just keep them in the freezer even when empty.

 

[seaplane]

My fish won't eat "left overs", so I defrost daily. I cut up cubes or LRS package into small serving sizes to store.

 

[JRAD]

I use Jell-O shot cups- they are small- 2 ounce size and they have a lid. (they are sold in the grocery store as condiment cups) I put I cube of omega 3 enriched brine and one cube of marine cuisine. I put that in the refrigerator in my fish room for 3 hrs to thaw. Feed half the first night then the rest the next night. Thawing slowly in the refrigerator keeps the food from ever reaching room temp. I add selcon 2-3x per week. Cups can be reused many times!

 

[themcnertney]

I typically get an assortment of different cubed and flat sheet food. I break all the cubes and defrost them and the sheets. I put all this into a plastic container. When I choose to feed the frozen assortment, I defrost the whole container by putting it in my sink in very hot water. I then pour it into a strainer and rinse with RO/DI. I then pour this into a small cup of tank saltwater. I then dump that into the tank. When done, I put the container back in the freezer until the next feeding. Then the process is done all over.

 

[JumboShrimp]

I just use a stainless steel tea-leaf strainer over a cup to dissolve a cube or two in water.

 

[Bekko]

I believe in feeding the widest variety of frozen foods to satisfy the different sizes of fish and inverts in my DT. Consequently I have to thaw some of each of the six frozen foods which I do by filling a sealed plastic container with the mix of cubes and keep them in the fridge. The mix lasts about 5-6 days.

 

[Captain Quint]

For at least the past 15 years I allow cubes of frozen Mysis to thaw at room temp with added Selcon at around 0730 hrs and feed at 0800 hrs. I take 1/2 of it when thawed and add a very small amount of flakes stirred in.

I keep the rest in the refrigerator until about 1730 hrs and repeat. So I guess my second feeding has been stored for ~9 1/2 hours with no issues.

 

[Ento-Reefer]

Thanks so much to everyone that posted and participated in the poll. I have learned something new. It seems those that store defrosted foods in the frig don't have any problems feeding it to their fish even after 4-5 days. I think I will stick to defrosting what I need, but I now feel comfortable enough to store the extra for a few hours to feed later the same day.

 

[anit77]

Why would thawed frozen food go bad in 2 tin4 days if kept in the fridge? I've even fed fish, shrimp and scallop that's been in a sushi case for a few days. Is there something different about frozen mysis or fish food than there is with seafood that you but in a store?

I buy PE & Hikari mysis in the large sheets and that it in rodi water, drain and rinse again. Especially PE, its usually pretty nasty. I then mix that with a variety thawed cubes. Mussel, squid, Emerald Entree and many others that I rotate every few days. I feed that over 3 days and repeat.

If I'm doing something wrong I'd like to know and maybe I'll portion it out and refreeze. I've got 13 fish in a 220, including 2 Blue Throat Triggers and a couple big tangs, and 4 fish in a 60 frag. I takes a while to thaw enough to feed them all.

 

[Golgoroth]

Here is a curveball... I have a 32 gallon biocube, so I feed 1/4 of a mysis cube per day. I supplement with some pellets. I thaw an entire cube and drain (not rinse) off the excess liquid. Then I portion it into 4 small solo cups with lids, and refreeze three of them. Feed the fourth, and re-thaw the other three one at a time daily for the next few days. I just set the cup on the lid of the cube and it thaws in about three minutes. This works particularly well when I am out of town, and someone else is in charge of feeding. I can set up a week's worth of instant dinners very easily.

I found jello shooter cups at the grocery store. I reuse them a bunch of times, just keep them in the freezer even when empty.

I also have a 32gal biocube and only feed frozen food. My process is to put a dozen various frozen cubes in a ziplock bag and then smash it a few times with a large cast iron skillet. Then I can feed 1/4 tablespoon of frozen per meal.

The smashing is one of those fun delicate applications of force as you can quickly turn the frozen protein into tiny particles. Smashing it just enough to make it easily measurable with a measuring spoon but still leaving some bigger chunks of frozen.

 

[Rakie]

I defrost 2-3 days food and mix it with a bunch of food additives and leave in the fridge.

Thawing food is fine, the problem is people try and re-freeze it which ruins it and turns it into mush.