Free-flow freezing is a must when you have fresh vegetables in excess. Here’s how!
Whether you are looking for points on how to freeze courgette, green beans, snap peas, corn, broccoli or cauliflower, leeks you’ve come to the right place. In fact, virtually any vegetable can be free-flow frozen using this method.
The beauty of free-flow is that you can grab a handful of frozen veggies when you need them, rather than them all being stuck together in one big lump. And, due to the blanching process, your veggies are less likely to go all soggy (which they may well do if you attempt to freeze them raw).
Blanching is necessary to stop the enzymes in their tracks but not enough to fully cook the vegetables through. Draining and plunging the hot blanched vegetables in ice cold water stops them from continuing to cook off the heat. We want a short, sharp, blanch and chill process! I’ve previously posted a very successful blog on How to Freeze Leeks.
This is extremely handy when your garden provides you with a glorious glut of crops. It seems all the beans and courgettes come at once, don’t they!
This process works extremely well, not only for vegetables but for freezing grains too. Check out my Frozen Mystery Mix blog!
Preparation Tips before Blanching
Beans or Snap Peas: When preparing these ready for blanching, cut off the tops and tails and any stringy side seams (there’s more likely to be stringy seams when they are more mature).
Courgettes or Squash: If they are picked young young with soft outer skin you can leave them on. If they are more mature and have an obvious soft/seedy centre, I scoop or cut them out and discard before blanching. While these would freeze, they don’t reconstitute well (will go mushy) and the seeds may be hard.
Spinach, Kale or Chard: remove the leafy greens from the centre stalk and tear the leaves into chunky pieces. Once blanched and drained, squish them into ice cube containers so each portion can be used as you need them. If the ice tray is required, simply take the frozen pods of greens and store them in an air-tight bag or container.
How to Free-flow Freeze fresh vegetables
- Wash and prepare your vegetables.
- Cut vegetables into similar sized lengths, florets, or rounds.
- Bring a saucepan of salted water to the boil.
- Once boiling, add your vegetables.
- Boil for no more than 2 minutes then immediately take off the heat, drain, then plunge into icy water.
- Once the vegetables are chilled, drain again.
- Tip onto a clean tea towel or paper towel in a single layer, then pat dry.
- Once fully absent of moisture, lay vegetables in a single layer on a tray lined with baking paper.
- Freeze for at least 2 hours or overnight if you wish.
- Transfer frozen veggies into a zip lock bag!
Enjoy whenever you need them! There is no need to thaw them before cooking in your next dish, just throw them in as they are.
