We’ve all seen it – we open our freezer door and see those dry patches of white stuff under the plastic of our foods, or even on the top layer of our ice cream. Yeeech. The good news is that freezer burn wont make us sick, but it can make our foods taste bland and chewy. It is created when food is exposed directly to cold air.

You can prevent it! And prevention starts as soon as you get home from the supermarket.

Keep all frozen foods in their original sealed packages, then place in another plastic freezer bag. Push as much of the air out of the package as you can.

If you want to open a package and divide into smaller portions and freeze those separately, remove the pieces from the original package – then wrap the individual portions tightly in a plastic cling wrap – again try to remove all the excess air. Then wrap in aluminum foil, then place in a plastic freezer bag.

Freezer burn seems to just love those pints of ice cream. To keep it out, make sure that you put a piece of plastic cling wrap or aluminum foil over the top of the container then replace the lid.

As with all frozen foods, be sure you write the date that you first put your foods in the freezer on the outside of the package. And while most people realize that foods won’t stay forever in there, we have a tendency to forget that after 6 months or so there will be a loss of flavor and texture.