Botulism from thawed frozen corn?

[southerngurl]

Hi,
I just got some corn from the freezer and thawed it out. It was sealed in a jar, since it was put in at room temperature and then cooled in the freezer. I tasted it and it had gone bad. Obviously this freezer has thawed at some point and the corn went bad. Oooo was it bad. The corn looked normal, but was sour and rotton. I am worried about botulism now, what's the likelyhood it could have grown. How long does it take for it to grow to a dangerous level? I guess I'll be watching for my eyes to get droopy.

I'm wondering, if it was sour, does that mean acid?

[Pony]

Just to be on the safe side, why don't you give your local poison control center a call? Hang on to the corn, for now, so if they want to test it, you have the goods.

It can take 12-48 hours for symptoms to manifest, and if the corn was that nasty and you tasted it... well, just call the hospital to check it out. Botulism is pretty nasty stuff to mess with.

I'm not an alarmist by any means, but I truly believe it would be prudent to check this out ASAP.

Please let us know what happens.

[southerngurl]

Thanks for the response.

My mom went ahead and called the Poison Control Center. He said he didn't really think it would have botulism, but said pretty much all we could do is sit around and see if I start to get blurred/double vision. Gee thanks.

This is what I was wondering. Since it wasn't actually canned, it would have unsealed when it defrosted. Wouldn't this mean that other bacteria would have grown rather than botulism, since it wasn't the air-free environment that botulism loves?

[Pony]

I don't know how air-free botulism likes it, but daresay there's precious little air in a freezer...

I was going to make a joke about applying it to any wrinkles you dislike, but I think I'll wait until you get the "all clear" before I wise crack...

[southerngurl]

[fin29]

The sour taste you had was probably alcohol that started being produced if/when the freezer thawed out enough to let the corn start to ferment. That, with some bacteria that no doubt lived there and reproduced as well gave you that nice aromatic cocktail you tasted. I wouldn't worry too much about it, especially now that you know the warning signs for the bad stuff.

[Don Armstrong]

I'm inclined to agree that what you have is probably stuff that has fermented, then maybe even gone on to turn to acetic acid (like making vinegar). Probably mixed with nasty mould as well. This implies that the freezer was unpowered for many days. While the corn is unlikely to kill a healthy person, I'd be extremely concerned about anything else that may have been in that freezer at the same time - meat of any kind particularly. I'd also make extreme efforts to figure out why the freezer could have lost power for so many days, and fix it so it can't happen again. Whether that's a plug not in properly, or an idiot who disconnected or powered-off the thing, or what - you have to make sure it doesn't recur. A freezer full of food is a lot of money to lose - stinky too - and you don't want to face this uncertainty about food quality again.

[bubbba]

I imagine that you will be fine. Didn't you spit the corn out pretty darn fast once you realized it was bad??

One of lifes nastiest surprises is a freezer that goes kaputzki what a awful stink and expensive mess at that.

[southerngurl]

Oh yea, I spit it out as fast as I could! It was wicked :no: . I then proceeded to rince my mouth out with water and spit some more, and my mom to laughing at me, until I brought up botulism.
Don't worry, we won't be eating stuff out of that freezer. I guess what happened was the ice built up and caused the door not to close properly (it had alot of ice, we just got it a few months ago, but it's an old one from my grandma), but then it sealed up again. We have two other freezers, and they are the ones that have the bulk of the food in them (we had a cow done a while back, so we needed three freezers). What really kills me is all the work I put into that dang corn. My grandpa grew a bunch and I ended up with like, 5-6 grocery bags full of it. Some of it I left on the cob, some I made into cream-style corn, some into regular corn, some was froze in the husks. All of it was work :waa: . I did get to eat a little of it, and it was really good. I was just so proud of my dang corn. :waa:
I'm going the vinegar route, it was sweet corn... Yes, vinegar doesn't sound so bad.

[fin29]

Originally Posted by bubbba

One of lifes nastiest surprises is a freezer that goes kaputzki what a awful stink and expensive mess at that.

All the more reason to spend a piddly $10 to make sure you're notified when your freezer temp. starts going up.

http://www.maxiaids.com/store/prodVi...idproduct=3234

[southerngurl]

Cool! (no pun intended)

[9Pines]

I just thought I'd share a tip to help know if your freezer has thawed and refroze with you you knowing it.

Put a small bag of about five icecubes into a baggy and keep that on the top layer of your freezer. If your freezer thawed..you'll know it by that baggy and the refroze water from your icecubes.