Care and Defrosting Instructions
Thank you for purchasing a Community Seafood product! If you have not yet checked out information about your fisherman make sure to scan the QR code to find out who caught your fillet of fish! Want to learn about all of our fishermen and the seafood they catch? Check out https://www.communityseafood.com/about-us/meet-the-fishermen.
When you are ready to use the frozen product we recommend two methods to defrost your seafood:
Refrigerator Thawing (Highly Recommended)
To keep your seafood at the highest quality we recommend defrosting over the course of 24 hours. Remove the vacuum sealed frozen fillet from the vacuum sealed bag and place the fillet on a paper towel lined plate on the low shelf in the fridge. When the product has defrosted completely, wash off any of the excess liquid that has accumulated, pat the fillet dry with a paper towel, season, cook, and enjoy!
While defrosting you can cover your fillet with seran wrap, but it may slow down the defrosting process!Once the seafood has been defrosted use within 24 hours for optimal freshness and safety.
PRO TIP: Put the frozen fillet in a paper towel lined bowl or a container while defrosting. As the fish defrosts it will lose liquid and this creates condensation. It is easier to clean a bowl rather than a fridge shelf! Also, if the paper towels become too soggy, throw them out and replace with fresh paper towels. This will keep your fillet from sitting in “fish jous” which can negatively affect the quality of the fillet!
Cool Water Thawing (Recommended)
If you are like me, you don’t always know what you are having for dinner 24 hours in advance! This method holds up in quality but does speed up the process, however it does require you being able to “watch” the seafood. Remove the vacuum sealed frozen fillet from the vacuum sealed bag and place in a new ziploc bag. Completely submerge your bagged fillet in a bowl of cold water. You will want to change out the bowl of water every 30 – 45 minutes. Fillets that weigh approximately a pound take about 90 minutes to defrost. DO NOT use warm water — while this will speed up the process it can encourage bacteria growth to harmful levels! Cook immediately after defrosting.
PRO TIP: Fish cooks quickly (for the most part!) while your fish is defrosting prepare the other parts of you meal — be your own sous chef and prepare all the ingredients! That way you can keep an eye on the water temperature, when it feels significantly cooler from the starting temperature change out the water!
Interested in fresh seafood? Check out if we have a pick-up location in your neighborhood: https://www.communityseafood.com/join-now
