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From WHO, World Health Organization, and the Spanish Agency of Food Security and Nutrition (AESAN), insist on the importance of freezing fresh fish to eliminate dreaded Anisakis. The parasite, which lives in fresh fish and is not eliminated by normal freezing process, is a worm with dangerous health consequences that can be even more serious in sick people since it affects vital organs and, in some cases, causes extreme allergic reactions.
But how can we avoid it? Is it healthier to stop eating fish? The fact is that in terms of public health, it is more dangerous not eating fish than to avoid consumption for fear of Anisakis. Nutritionists and food technologists have it clear: you have to eat fish to eat a balanced diet.
This year there are so many cases that the experts do not hesitate and talk about epidemics and insist on the obligation to do things well, acting responsibly. Anisakis is a problem that affects public health and that catering establishments can treat using the best tools: Infrico equipment.
For more than ten years, European restaurants have been forced to freeze fish, specifically in Spain for twelve years, and it is a very important practice, as Fedepesca and AESAN insist in their information campaigns. In this regard, Juan Manuel Martinez de Estarrona, director of Technical Office of Infrico, offers the best option: “The larvae are destroyed by cooking, frying, baking or pressing at more than 60ºC, or by freezing and maintaining the frozen product at temperature below -20°C in the heart of the product for at least 24 hours. However, getting this in domestic refrigerators is complicated even if it is a three-star or four-star freezer, so the time is extended up to 5 days. In the case of collective catering, Infrico offers rapid temperature blast chillers that are the perfect solution, since they ensure the freezing of the entire volume of the product at temperatures below -20 ºC in a fast way so that it prevents the formation of ice macro-crystals that break the structure of the cells, and the quality of the product is improved. And even, we can freeze the fish at a temperature of -35 ºC and later we only need to keep it frozen at that temperature for a minimum period of 15 hours with the consequent time saving. In short, with the Infrico blast chillers the chefs will be able to have the product beforehand and with greater safety and quality”.
The guidelines for risk reduction should cover all phases of the food chain, from practices during the capture and subsequent handling, technological treatments of processed products, to recommendations aimed at collective catering and consumer, as last links of the chain where prevention and eradication are the key to get a success result. In the case of Anisakis these are clear and very easy to follow; as easy as always freezing the fish if it is going to be consumed raw.
The Infrico blast chiller is, today, continues Martinez de Estarrona, “an essential in the kitchens of restaurants and cafeterias. It is a professional equipment of food preservation that serves both, to meet the standards of food safety required in the catering sector and to facilitate, speed and make profitable the work of chefs and food handlers in general”.
The functionality of these refrigerators is achieved through the process called abatement, which consists of rapidly cooling and freezing fresh food at very low temperatures, with the dual advantages that this implies: prolong the food shelf-life and optimize its conservation, all in a fast and efficient way.
And how is it done? Providing a very strong air flow at very low temperature (-40ºC) that affects the product on all sides. This flow generated via fans causes a cooling in record time that achieves a uniform process, from outside to inside reaching the center of the product. From this moment on, the conservation phase begins which maintains the temperature during the set time, simplifying the control by kitchen staff. All this process is done through a specific working cycle of the Infrico controller. This process inactivates the larvae of the parasite, and completely prevents Anisakis poisoning.
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