According to the calendar, today is the last day of summer. Sigh. And today I finished the last of our garden strawberries that we had frozen from early in the season. Sigh again. They were so good. We used them mostly in smoothies and today I blended strawberries with some of our frozen peaches, a bit of vanilla greek yogurt, frozen banana, a dash of milk, about three ice cubes, and a splash of lemon juice for jazziness. Yum.
I think freezing is so easy. Last year we had a surplus of tomatoes and decided to freeze them for use in spaghetti sauce, chili, etc. If you've never tried freezing, simply wash the whole fruit well and remove any mushy spots. Then lay them out to dry on a towel. Once dry, spread the fruit onto a cookie sheet and put in the freezer. When they are frozen through, you can store them in containers or gallon zip top bags. We didn't even bother to remove the skins prior to freezing. I find it just as easy to remove the skins when I am ready to cook with them. All you have to do is dunk the whole frozen tomatoes into hot water for about a minute then off slide the skins.
Do you freeze some of your garden produce?
I think freezing is so easy. Last year we had a surplus of tomatoes and decided to freeze them for use in spaghetti sauce, chili, etc. If you've never tried freezing, simply wash the whole fruit well and remove any mushy spots. Then lay them out to dry on a towel. Once dry, spread the fruit onto a cookie sheet and put in the freezer. When they are frozen through, you can store them in containers or gallon zip top bags. We didn't even bother to remove the skins prior to freezing. I find it just as easy to remove the skins when I am ready to cook with them. All you have to do is dunk the whole frozen tomatoes into hot water for about a minute then off slide the skins.
Do you freeze some of your garden produce?
I just finished chopping and freezing a boat load of crabapples! You're right, freezing is so much easier! Plus I can choose to do little things with them throughout the winter (like crabapple bread) rather than making one massive recipe now (like crabapple jelly).
ReplyDeletewe are looking into purchasing a deep freeze because our top freezer is so full of produce from the season. & i will follow you in a big *sigh* over the end of summer. siiiigh.
ReplyDeleteIdle Wife, any chance we could get a recipe for crabapple bread?
ReplyDeleteI love tend. Thank you thank you thank you for the stories, the photos, the ideas, the beauty, and the sharing.
Instead of canning my tomato sauce, I put it in freezer safe jars. I am also going to try the freezing whole thing too.
ReplyDeleteI always freeze pesto, but I'd like to try freezing some other herb pastes for something different.
I froze lots of blackberries because in my battle with the birds, I picked a lot of them less than ripe. They'll be perfect for making jam on the first cold day.
Finally, I freeze my lima beans and black eyed peas. So easy!
We freeze a lot of our fruit (berries, peaches, rhubarb...) and also peas, kale, and corn. We use the fruit for smoothies all winter long.
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