Can freezing bread make it healthier? | Hacker News Reader

Can freezing bread make it healthier?

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7 pointsmfld9 comments

This article lost me when it stated that Arborio rice is fluffier than basmati.

Healthier or not, freezing bread is very good at making it prematurely stale.

It's definitely healthier for me because I just throw it out after.

This couldn't be further from the truth in my experience. I always freeze fresh bread and it's almost indistinguishable from fresh bread after thawing and heating it up in the microwave. Leaving it out on the counter for >24h makes it stale far more, and refrigerating it accelerates the staling process even more.

I understand. I wouldn't do it in the microwave, personally, though. I think the oven gives better results. But I was talking about using the bread without reheating it.

My experience in that is the opposite of yours. Once frozen, the bread is stale. You can cover that up by heating the bread, but that effect only lasts for as long as the bread is warm.

I find the "stale" thing so problematic that I would rather just not eat the bread.

But everyone's tastes are different! If it works for you, that's awesome.

Our freezer always has baguettes and loaves of sliced bread in it. Thaw the sliced bread, and it's good as new. And the baguettes are wrapped in tin foil and get warmed in the convection oven at 170F. They come out as if they were freshly baked. Any difference from fresh is negligible. It tastes much better than if it was on the counter for a day.

> Thaw the sliced bread, and it's good as new

Not with any bread I've tried it with! Once frozen, in my opinion, the bread is only good for making croutons.

> the baguettes are wrapped in tin foil and get warmed in the convection oven at 170F. They come out as if they were freshly baked

This is true (whether or not the bread was frozen), yes.

As a data point, we only ever have whole wheat sliced bread. I don't think we ever tried white bread. Sometimes from a bakery, other times various brands from the grocery store. It never comes out stale.

That probably matters a lot. Most of the bread I eat is sourdough or (occasionally) white, and is bread I bake myself. Whole wheat is not to my taste, so I don't make it.

That I make it myself is also an important data point. It means that the vast majority of the bread I eat was baked in the 48 hours (max), so is at the peak of freshness. I really notice when bread is past that peak! When it happens to my bread, I make croutons or bread crumbs out of it.

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