如何安全地解凍冷凍雞肉

Getting chicken safely from a rock-hard frozen state to a thawed ready-to-cook state raises a lot of questions. Here are the answers.

將堅如磐石的冷凍雞肉解凍至可以做飯狀態，會出現很多問題。下面交給你如何去做。

First, chicken should never be thawed on the counter at room temperature or in a bowl of hot water. The following methods should allow you to thaw chicken and keep it out of the “danger zone” (40 to 140°F), which is the temperature zone that allows bacteria to grow.

首先,雞肉不應在室溫下或一碗熱水中解凍。下列方法將避免解凍時的“危險區域”(40到140華氏溫度)，這個是促使細菌生長的溫度區間。

In general, larger cuts of chicken, especially a whole chicken, should be thawed in the refrigerator, as the chicken will start to cook on the outside if it is thawed in a microwave, and it will take a very long time in a bowl of water. However, smaller cuts, and especially boneless cuts, do well with the cold bowl of water or microwave method.

一般來說，大份額雞肉，特別是整隻雞，應該在冰箱裏解凍。如果馬上需要解凍雞肉，那麼就需要在微波爐解凍，而用一碗水解凍會花費很長的時間。然而，較小份額的特別是需要去除骨頭的話，在碗裏解凍和在微波爐裏解凍都可以。

This is the most reliable and safe method, and also the one that requires no hands-on attention. But you need to plan ahead, especially if you are thawing a whole bird, or a large amount of bone-in pieces in a single package. Even a pound of ground chicken or a couple of pounds of chicken breasts will probably take up to a day to fully thaw in the fridge, and a five pound bird might take two days.

這是最可靠和安全的方法，也不需要時刻關注。但是你需要提前計劃，特別是如果你融化整隻雞，或是一大包帶骨頭的肌肉。甚至一磅雞肉或幾磅的雞胸肉在冰箱裏完全融化將可能需要一天的時間，而一隻5磅的雞可能需要兩天。

You can leave chicken thawed in this way for another day or two in the fridge before cooking. Frozen chicken can be placed tightly sealed (either in vacuum sealed bags or sturdy, leak-proof storage bags) in a bowl of cold water. Do NOT use hot water! Besides possibly causing bacteria to form, warm water will also start to “cook” the outside of the meat before the middle is thawed). Change the water every 30 to 45 minutes to make sure the water stays cold. Ground meat might thaw in an hour, a small amount of boneless chicken will probably thaw in 1 to 2 hours, larger amounts and bigger cuts may take a few hours.

在做飯之前，用這種方法你可以提前一天或兩天讓雞肉在冰箱裏解凍。冷凍雞肉可以密封放置(在真空密封袋或堅固的、不漏的存儲袋)在一碗冷水中。不要使用熱水！除了可能導致滋生細菌外，溫水可能會讓肉出現外面解凍而中間依然凍着）。每30到45分鐘換一次水以確保水冷的。碎肉可能在一個小時內就會融化，少量的無骨雞肉可能會在1 - 2小時融化，大份額的肌肉可能要花費幾小時。