| 释义 |
▪ I. deep-freeze, deep freeze orig. U.S.
[f. deep a. + freeze n.1]
1. (Written Deep-freeze.) The registered American trade-name of a type of refrigerator capable of rapid freezing. Hence, a refrigerator or process in which food can be quickly frozen and stored almost indefinitely at a very low temperature. Also attrib.
1941Official Gaz. U.S. Pat. Off. 8 July 260/2 Deepfreeze. For Refrigerating Apparatus and Parts Thereof. 1942Science Illustr. Mar. 3/1 The Deepfreeze home locker looks like an up-ended white enameled barrel with an encased compressor housing at its side. 1951Good Housek. Home Encycl. 218/1 ‘Polythene’..is particularly suitable for deep-freeze and quick-frozen foods. Ibid. 473/2 A refrigerator with a special deep-freeze compartment. 1957W. H. Whyte Organization Man 250 The chickens are stacked high in the deep freeze. 1958Sunday Times 27 Apr. 22/6 The housewife with a deep freeze can keep them for six months. 1969News of World 23 Nov. 9/5 They paid a deposit on a deep-freeze but then heard nothing more.
2. transf. and fig. ‘Cold storage’; suspension of activity; suspended animation. Also attrib.
1949L. C. Wroth in C. F. Bühler et al. Standards of Bibliogr. Description 114 Most historians won't bother. They are not interested in bibliography. For all that they may do about it, the meat will lie in the deep-freeze compartment until the end of time. 1950N.Y. Times Bk. Rev. 8 Oct. 3/1 This can never be reprinted too often; it is a classic of deep-freeze. 1951I. Shaw Troubled Air iv. 84 You must have led your life in deep freeze for the last twenty years. 1952Birmingham (Ala.) News 6 May 26/3 A Swedish doctor has predicted that ‘deep freeze’ operations on human beings may not be far off. He said this is a technique in which heart action is purposely stopped by lowering the body temperature. 1957Daily Mail 26 Sept. 9/5 The ‘deep-freeze’ girl who lay in a coma for 14 weeks. 1958Spectator 6 June 722/1 It [sc. a suburb] is not alive either, of course; perhaps suspended animation is the best description, a kind of socio-economic deep freeze.
▪ II. deep-freeze, v. orig. U.S.
[f. prec.]
trans. To subject to a deep-freeze process; to refrigerate; also transf. and fig. So deep-freezer, a deep-freeze; deep-freezing vbl. n.; deep-frozen ppl. a.
1949Time 18 July 34/1 Helen Hayes stuck a hand into her deep freezer. 1951Good Housek. Home Encycl. 63/1 Deep freezer. Ibid. 438/1 Most fruits are suitable for deep freezing. 1953A. Huxley Let. 8 Dec. (1969) 689 The product is deep-frozen the moment it leaves the pod. 1956Sci. News Let. 3 Nov. 279/2 Deep-frozen shrimps from India may soon be making an appearance on dining tables in the United States. 1957‘B. Buckingham’ Boiled Alive xxxiii. 249 If the cook deep-froze the body, he knew about the murder. 1959Listener 5 Feb. 263/2 We all know the deep-frozen expert from the one who is humanly concerned to put something across. 1959Observer 15 Mar. 16/3 Why should Gilbert and Sullivan be specially exempt?.. Perpetuity would deep-freeze them as well. 1959Woman 2 May 33/1 With deep freezing and modern refrigerated transport, fish doesn't depend on the season nearly as much as it used to. 1970Daily Tel. 28 Apr. 17 Leading manufacturers of refrigerators and deep-freezers..are producing space-saving models which are ideal for our small British kitchens. 1971Ibid. 25 Jan. 10 No doubt these arguments are today accepted by all but a few deep-frozen ideologues on Labour's Left wing. |