Buying Frozen Seafood is Almost Always Better, Says an RD

For many individuals, these *checks notes* unprecedented instances have changed the way we eat and even buy groceries. Past stockpiling canned beans and TP, my freezer is now full of issues like frozen berries, zucchini noodles, spinach, and cauliflower gnocchi—something that requires the naked minimal of effort from me to show it right into a wholesome meal now that I am cooking virtually all of my meals myself. However one of many freezer aisle meals I have been overlooking? Frozen seafood.

On the whole, frozen meals has a little bit of a foul status that is not deserved, registered dietitian Tracy Lockwood Beckerman, RD, says in an episode of Nicely+Good’s YouTube sequence You Versus Food. “The precise act of freezing meals doesn’t make meals wholesome or unhealthy,” Beckerman says. Basically, freezing simply acts as a “pause button” that extends the lifespan of the meals (and the nutritional vitamins and vitamins it comprises), she says. That is as true for fish as it’s for vegatables and fruits. “Fish might be much more nutritious when frozen,” she says, as a result of it is usually frozen virtually as quickly because it’s caught, which preserves vitamins at their peak.

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In the meantime, the “contemporary” fish on show on the grocery retailer truly is perhaps a number of weeks outdated, Beckerman says. Most of it has been beforehand frozen in any case, she says, as a result of it is important for quality and safety. But that fish is commonly dearer than what you’d discover within the freezer part…which principally means you are being charged a premium for defrosting. Womp, womp.

Plus, Beckerman says that purchasing frozen seafood would possibly include sustainability advantages “because it decreases waste.” (Mainly, frozen fish has an extended shelf life than contemporary, which reduces the danger of it going unhealthy earlier than you are in a position to make use of it.) In fact, you continue to need to comply with cross-reference your frozen picks with a good group like Monterey Bay Aquarium’s Seafood Watch to make sure that the fish you buy is not endangered.

Not all People are as short-sighted as me in terms of shopping for frozen seafood. In actual fact, Alaska Seafood tells me through electronic mail that recent data exhibits that the U.S. is seeing document gross sales of seafood—and in August, frozen seafood gross sales went up by 42 p.c in comparison with the identical time final yr.

That mentioned, it is also nice if and when you possibly can to purchase contemporary seafood instantly from fishermen by way of CSA applications and direct-to-consumer operations like Drifters Fish and Wild Alaskan Company. When doing so, prioritize fish which are “in season,” to make sure that your catch of the day is really contemporary. However typically, in case your predominant supply of seafood comes from the grocery retailer, it may be a reasonably good thought to simply skip the counter and go straight to the freezer part.

Watch the video above to see the opposite meals Beckerman recommends shopping for frozen—and the 2 meals she says you need to at all times purchase contemporary.