Freezing: cream cheese, cottage cheese, or sour cream??!
Freezing: cream cheese, cottage cheese, or sour cream??
Has anyone frozen any of these and what were the results - were they edible once thawed???
Answers:
My mother did freeze cream cheese, but it was in a recipe where it was spread on a flower tortilla with other filling. She took it out of the freezer and cut it up in wheels and the cream cheese held up well.
Cream cheese has such a long freshness date that there is no good reason to freeze it.
I found this on a companies web site.
Can I freeze Cottage Cheese?
DO NOT freeze product. It is not a safety hazard, but the quality will decrease if frozen (product will become gritty, watery, and the curd will break easily).
Can I freeze Sour Cream?
Do not freeze. It is not a safety hazard, but the quality will decrease if frozen (product will become lumpy and water separation may occur).
none of these freeze well. the water content is dried up in the freezer and so when they thaw it is kind of crumbly.i have made cheesecake and frozen it and it was alright, but I did have it very well wrapped.
Freezing ANY dairy product can be an "iffy" proposition. The water content is the big problem; if the product hasn't been somehow separated from the water it contains, it will separate on it's own in the freezer.
Of the examples you provided, cream cheese will successfully freeze, assuming it hasn't been removed from the aluminum foil wrapper. It has the lowest moisture content, and the airtight wrapping will prevent it from separating. Along these lines, most brick cheeses (still vacuum-packed in cellophane) will successfully freeze. The important thing is to let the product thaw thoroughly before opening the package.
And any of the products you mentioned would still be perfectly edible after freezing/thawing, no matter how watery they turn out; they wouldn't be very appealing to eat, though.