I like to keep sweet potato puree on hand to throw into my dishes. I was fortunate enough to be gifted two boxes of sweet potatoes this summer - that's 80 lbs of delicious orange tubers! Sweet potatoes keep in a cool, dry place for a long time, so we used them fresh as long as we could (my kids groaned when they saw sweet potato fries coming their way by the end of the summer), and then I got busy freezing.
Sweet Potatoes Ah, sweet potatoes! A favorite among the adults around here. But, even peaches that are a mushy mess will be delish in a smoothie! I'll let you know next Spring what I think of this freezing method. This is by far the easiest way to freeze peaches, but I'm a bit worried that they will be a mushy mess - that without the sugar pack they'll lose their texture - when they thaw. I'm really curious how these peaches will turn out.
I cut my peaches in half to remove the pit, but left the peel on. I did things just slightly different, though. Kitchen Scoop peaked my interest with this article about freezing whole peaches. I'll pop open a bag of these peaches in the middle of winter to make some peach bread, some peach BBQ sauce, or whatever peachy dish tickles my fancy. Last year I used Fruit Fresh instead of crushed vitamin C (which is essentially what Fruit Fresh is), and the results were equally satisfying. I should note, however, that I left out the Hungarian paprika his recipe calls for. The peaches retain their color and flavor and much of their texture all through the winter in the sugar/vitamin C solution. Second, I used Alton Brown's method of freezing peaches. First, last year I made these frozen peach crisps in a jar from Eating Well Anywhere.
Such a treat in the middle of winter! It's a little time consuming, but I promise well worth the effort. I was so happy with the results of last year's frozen peaches. Peaches This is my second year to freeze peaches. This winter I'll pull them out to use in pies, put into yogurt and smoothies, or maybe make these divine looking dark chocolate raspberry bars from Fake Food Free. Once the berries were frozen, I transferred them to a ziploc bag and back into the freezer. To freeze the raspberries, I simply laid the washed and dried raspberries in a single layer on a baking sheet and put in the freezer. Usually we just eat them out of hand as we pick them, but we always have more than we can eat, so this year I decided to freeze the extra raspberries. The raspberries from our canes are impossibly tender - definitely not like the raspberries you find in the grocery store - and so sweet and juicy. We were fortunate to inherit a big bunch of raspberry canes when we bought our house. YUM! Raspberries This is my first year to freeze raspberries. When I'm ready to use my frozen corn, I just stick it in a pan with just a little bit of water and add salt and onion powder (my own thing - you can always leave that out) to taste. It seems in texture more like a creamed corn (without all of the added sugar, though). The resulting corn is quite a bit different than the corn you will find in the freezer section of your grocery store. Be sure to scrape your knife across the cob after cutting the kernels to get all of the leftover milk and juicy bits! Put in a bag, and freeze.
After boiling, quickly cool in a bucket of ice water. Simply shuck and silk the corn, and then boil the corn (blanch it) for a few minutes (I did them in 3 min batches this year). This year I bought 3 dozen ears of really good, sweet, fresh corn from my local vegetable stand to freeze for winter. So.I'm going to lay out a little primer of what I do with these favorites - corn, raspberries, peaches, and sweet potatoes (not really a summer food, but I happened to have a ton of sweet potatoes at my disposal this summer).Ĭorn Corn is so easy to freeze. I don't freeze all of the summer goodies that come our way for various reasons - I don't like the end result of frozen green beans, for example - but there are a few that I find well worth freezing. It's a little bit of summer in the dead of winter. There's nothing better than pulling out a bag of properly frozen peaches in the dead of winter to enjoy in a recipe or just eat straight. I've been wiling away my time trying to preserve a little of the summer goodness that we have been enjoying by freezing just a few of our favorite summer foods.įreezing foods can be time consuming, but the results are so worth it. Though winter is still a little ways off, the trees are already starting to change color, and we've had a few frosts already. Summer is way too short in my neck of the woods.