The internet is a source of endless information that can help you in almost every area of your life. Unfortunately, just because something gets popular online does not mean it is necessarily a good idea.
One example of this is a food safety ‘hack’ that has been circulating for years. The hack goes like this. First, take a cup filled with water and place it in the freezer until it is hard ice. Next, place a coin on top and return it to the freezer. If your freezer experiences a power outage, the ice will begin to melt, giving you an indication of how long the power was out and whether the food in the freezer is still safe to eat.
For example, if the coin only goes down a small amount and is frozen below a half-inch of ice, the rest of the food in the freezer is likely still safe to eat. If, however, the coin is at the bottom of the cup, that means the ice was at least mostly melted, so the food should be thrown out.
While the idea sounds good on the surface, there are some major problems with it that make it unreliable at best.
To start with, ice floats. So, depending on how the melting took place, it is entirely possible that a significant amount of the ice could have melted, leaving the coin floating on the small remaining ‘iceberg’ so that when it refreezes, it still appears on top. This, of course, would lead one to believe that the food in the freezer is still good, which it is not.
Fortunately, there are many other ways to monitor your freezer’s performance and avoid consuming spoiled food. The best option is to simply purchase a temperature monitor (ideally one with an alarm) so that you can be notified if the temperature ever dips below a set level.
If you want a low-tech option, the University of Nebraska has a method that still uses ice, but it is much more reliable. Simply take a handful of ice cubes and place them in a sealed plastic bag. If you look at the bag and the ice is still properly formed as cubes, the temperature never dipped low enough to cause melting.
If the cubes have frozen flat, they completely melted at one point and the food should be thrown out. Anything in between indicates a partial melt and you can decide what to do based on how much has melted.
When it comes to food spoiling when in doubt, throw it out.
If you thought that was interesting, you might like to read about the mysterious “pyramids” discovered in Antarctica. What are they?