No pub kitchen can work efficiently or safely without a freezer. The size or number of freezers depends on the menu mix, but a freezer is a 'must-have' item of kitchen equipment.
A freezer sits in a corner of the pub kitchen and doesn't seem to do much work. It just keeps frozen food frozen. That is what tempts some pub operators to look to the local retail park for a freezer, rather than a commercial catering equipment showroom.
That is a big mistake. Pubs need rapid access to frozen food in busy service times. Rummaging in a domestic chest freezer for frozen chips, onion rings, scampi or a frozen lasagne among bags of bread rolls, ice-cream and something that has lost its label and sell-by date slows the food delivery process and is a chaotic way to store frozen food.
Commercial chest freezers can be useful for storing bulky foods that are not in constant demand, but the most efficient way to store frozen food is to use a commercial upright freezer cabinet. This will come with pull-out drawers that you can use to divide different types of frozen food.
For example, put ready meals in the top drawer, potato products on the next, then vegetables… going through the menu and ending up with desserts at the bottom of the cabinet. Everything is available to hand, with no rummaging and no forgotten food lying in pack ice at the bottom of a chest freezer.
That is the good-working-practice argument for a pub to buy a commercial upright freezer, but there is a more important one - food safety. The expensive component in a freezer is the motor or compressor, which drives the refrigerant around the cooling bars.
Manufacturers build motor performance according to the expected use, which means the number of times the freezer door or lid is going to be opened.
The simple science of a freezer is that when a door is opened, cold air comes out and hot air goes in. The motor and the thermostat are expected to maintain a safe temperature. In a domestic freezer, their performance is based on the few times a day the home fridge is likely to be opened. But freezers in a busy pub kitchen are going to be opened continually and a domestic freezer is not designed to cope with that high loss of chilled air.
Domestic freezers are also assumed to be sited in relatively cool kitchens, so the insulation is not designed for the heat of a busy pub kitchen. Using a domestic freezer in a pub kitchen carries the risk that the safe storage temperature for frozen food - usually recommended as -18ÞC or below - will not be met. That should not present a food safety issue unless the temperature rises significantly above
-18ÞC, but there can be food quality issues. Keeping food frozen to the right temperature keeps the texture right when it is cooked or defrosted and satisfies food safety regulations.
Professional pub kitchens should always have professional freezers.
Next month: Combi ovens.