Thawing frozen food in commercial kitchens can be a challenge, especially in bulk. Some chefs take it out of the freezer and put it in a fridge or coldroom – this is safe but it’s slow, sometimes taking days to defrost. Others run the frozen food under cold water. This is acceptable, but not suitable for large amounts of food. Apart from wasting water, staff need to monitor it constantly to ensure it doesn’t rise too high in temperature.
Now Williams has developed ThawSafe, an innovative thaw cabinet that’s faster than the fridge and brings a new level of food safety to a range of cooking processes including cook-chill and cook-freeze.
Thaw cabinets have been around for a while, but Williams has completely reengineered the concept. The Williams ThawSafe is a one door cabinet with 75kg capacity, over double that of its predecessor, in a smaller footprint.
The ThawSafe cabinet features a sleek new look with an easy to clean full length integral door handle. It comes equipped with eight GN2x1 shelves. Installation is simple, with its width allowing it to fit through a standard doorway. The cabinet is fitted with a standard waste drain at the base of the unit, allowing it to be connected to the main drain.
When thawing is done incorrectly, it can pose a serious risk to food safety. According to UK food hygiene regulations, it’s critical to ensure that food does not enter the "danger zone" where bacteria multiply rapidly. ThawSafe’s innovative design ensures controlled food safety while maximising the speed of the process.
The efficient airflow from the four fans within the cabinet ensures the cabinet temperature is 100% consistent, from top to bottom, so everything thaws at exactly the same rate. In the initial phase, the air temperature may be as high as 9°C, to kick start the process, but critically the food’s surface temperature never creeps into the bacteria danger zone above 5°C. At the end of the process, the cabinet automatically switches to chilled storage mode.
The new cabinet has an intuitive touchscreen controller with a simple to operate icon based menu. There are four programmes, three of which are preset for 75kg of food, 35 kg and low weight loads. A fourth can be customised for thawing to the operator’s needs, for example if they have specialist menu items. Once thawing is complete, an audible alarm sounds to signal the end of the cycle.
The ThawSafe runs on natural hydrocarbon refrigerant and uses high performance, high density, precision injected cfc-free insulation, so it is very much in accord with foodservice operators’ Carbon Net Zero aspirations.
“ThawSafe gives operators the right balance of speed with no compromise on safety. With the ever increasing focus on food safety, and many businesses looking to do more with fewer staff, we expect demand for thaw cabinets to grow in the coming years. Like all Williams products, ThawSafe is designed to meet the needs of modern kitchens.” says Keith Panks, Engineering Manager at Williams.
