ABSTRACT
I. Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 459
II. Developing and Marketing Frozen Ready Meals . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 460
A. Brief History of Frozen Ready Meals . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 460
B. The Market for Frozen Ready Meals . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 461
1. World Market . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 461
2. UK Market . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 461
3. Range of Meals Available . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 462
4. Consumer Acceptability of Frozen Ready Meals . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 464
C. The Complexities of Frozen Ready Meals . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 465
III. Methods of Manufacture . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 465
A. Pretreatment of Meal Components . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 465
1. Preparing and Modifying Sauces . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 466
2. Blanching Vegetables . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 466
3. Marinating, Coloring, and Cooking Meat . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 467
4. Modifying Other Ingredients . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 467
B. Manufacturing Methods . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 467
1. Cook-Assemble-Freeze . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 467
2. Frozen Sous-Vide . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 468
IV. Quality and Safety Issues . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 468
A. Factors Affecting the Eating Quality of Frozen Meals . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 469
1. Rancidity Development . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 469
2. Texture, Color, and Drip Loss Measurement . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 470
3. Acceptability and Sensory Attributes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 471
B. Effect of Speed of Freezing on Eating Quality . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 471
C. Effect of Fluctuating Storage Conditions on Eating Quality . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 471
D. Factors Affecting Safety of Frozen Meals . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 472
1. During Processing and Storage . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 472
2. During Thawing and Reheating . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 473
E. Factors Affecting Nutritional Quality of Frozen Meals . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 474
V. Conclusions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 475
References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 476
Freezing and frozen storage have long been the important method of refrigeration to ensure the
safety and quality of meat, poultry, fish, vegetable, and fruit products as described in other chapters.
However, more recently the emphasis has changed from simply preserving these raw materials as
the basis for further processing to adding value by manufacturing prepared foods. One such
example, the frozen ready meal, is consumed often with little or no further processing except
reheating. Therefore, the responsibility for building into the frozen ready meal the attributes of
sensory and nutritional quality, microbiological safety, convenience of handling, and reheating
demanded by the consumer, lie almost wholly in the hands of manufacturers and food retailers,
making use of their quality management processes. Satisfying consumers’ demands for high-
quality frozen ready meals thus brings together many of the challenges facing the frozen food
industry. These include selecting the most appropriate manufacturing treatments and raw materials
for the wide range of often complex recipe dishes, maintaining the quality of these food materials
up to the point of consumption, while taking into account the consumers’ sometimes unreliable role
in the final part of the chain, storage and reheating.
