Cold setting coating composition for foodstuffs

The present invention is a cold temperature activated batter used to coat fish portions cut from a uncooked, preformed, processed and frozen fish block and with cooked foods which are chilled before coating. The latent cold temperature of the chilled food, which is preferably fish, is in the range of approximately -10 DEG to 38 DEG F, which activates the batter so as to cause it to gel or set on the fish portions and, as a result, the batter coating adheres evenly and uniformly to each fish portion. After coating with the batter, the chilled fish portions may be also be coated with a toasted bread crumb before the batter sets, to form a bread coating mixture, in-situ, on the chilled fish portion. The bread crumbs may also include flavoured oils derived from frying battered and fried fish or fried battered and breaded chicken in vegetable oils for the purpose of imparting savory and fried food flavour characteristics to the non-fried food.