However, other factors can come into play to compromise the safety of cooked foods. Cooked foods can also be recontaminated by exposure to bacteria through lack of food-handler hygiene. Many consumers call with questions about long-term storage. There are actually two misunderstandings at work here. The second, that long-term storage compromises food safety.
Many consumers believe that spoiled food causes foodborne disease.
As our specialists explain, it's not so. Any food, fresh or frozen, can contain dangerous bacteria if it has been mishandled. The second consumer misunderstanding is that long-term storage can compromise food safety. In fact, the multiplication of most disease-causing organisms is slowed by refrigerator temperatures and stopped by freezing. The real issue with long-term storage is food quality, not food safety.