Check out how to freeze produce with these tips for freezing fruits and vegetables. Buying produce in season and stocking up is a great way to get the best prices. PLUS you will find a FREE Printable Produce Guide to tell you what’s in season, each season.
This summer I planted a garden for the first time and was overwhelmed by the amount of zucchini that grew. I knew right away that we would never eat it all. I also knew that a great way to not let it go to waste would be to freeze it. Freezing Fruit and Vegetables is a great way to save!
So, Why Should YOU Freeze Produce?
If you don’t have your own garden, you may notice certain times of the year, prices on specific fruit and veggies go down. That’s because it’s in peak season- and that’s the time to stock up! Another time to stock up is when you find great manager’s special markdowns. Freezing produce for you family can save you money, help with food prep in the future and gives your family great “fresh” produce all year round. Now you know you want to freeze produce for your family, but are wondering how to do it.
Here are some Tips for Freezing Vegetables and Fruit.
Freezing Produce Prep
- First be sure to wash all pieces and dry them thoroughly.
- Have freezer containers on hand. You can choose to use freezer specific storage baggies, plastic containers that seal tight or vacuum sealer bags. I personally use grocery store bought freezer baggies- with my own DIY vacuum sealer method (a straw to suck air out)! 😉
- You will also need freezer space. I have a separate deep freezer in my garage. As I mention in my Realistic Stockpiling post, it’s a hand-me-down avocado green, but it works great!
Techniques for Freezing Produce
- Flash Freezing: This technique is generally best for fruit. It will help you avoid the one big lump of frozen produce mess. To flash freeze, lay the items out on a cookie sheet and place in the freezer. When they have just frozen, take out and place in your tight sealing container. This way your berries, bananas or strips of green peppers will be in individual pieces not that big frozen clump
- Raw vs. Cooked: Generally speaking, fruit is best frozen raw as are most veggies. However there are some vegetable that are better “blanched” first. To blanch a vegetable, place it in a pot of water. Just when the water begins to boil, take out the vegetables and place them under cold water. This will help retain the sugars and nutrients in the vegetable. Corn, for instance, it best blanched and then cut off the cob.
- Meal Prep Packets: Another way to freeze your produce is in easy meal prep packets. For instance, we love chili in the winter. So I chop up the recipe amount of onions, red and green peppers and freeze them all together in one bag. Then they are ready to throw in the crock pot! Also when I am making asparagus as a side dish, I will cut the bottoms off in thin sliced pieces and freeze them. These are great added into any soup, casserole or sauce recipe (shhh, the kiddos won’t even know they are there).
Favorite Fruits and Vegetables to Freeze
- Corn
- Zucchini
- Carrots
- Peppers
- Onion
- Asparagus slices
- Berries
- Bananas (see more tips!)
- Grapes
If you are wondering when specific produce is in season, I have created a little printable cheat sheet so you can know what fruits and vegetables are in season and when. What’s In Season- Produce Guide Printable
I would love to hear about your experience in freezing fruit and vegetables. Do you make amazing fruit smoothies? Is there another veggie you freeze that I should try? And let me tell you, my kiddos LOVE frozen grapes. They say it’s like eating little popsicles (only much better for them!)
Super helpful! I mostly freeze meat and fish (and my hubby’s photography films). 🙂 But occasionally I do freeze some spinach or swiss chard. Luckily, I live in a place where most produce is in season all year long or the seasons are totally mixed up. For example, the apple season is just starting now. 🙂
Yes we freeze meat too especially when I find great manager’s special prices! 🙂
I found this post by visiting the Frugal Friday Link Up Party. I usually by my fruit and veggies in the frozen section. I really had no idea you could freeze fruit and veggies with out putting them in an already prepared dish. I am going to try to freeze some pears that are falling from my tree. 🙂
Thanks for visiting Janell. A pear tree, my kiddos would be in heaven! I have never frozen pears, but I would suggest giving them a little lemon juice bath first. That will help them from turning brown. Good luck- would love to hear how it turns out! 🙂
Thanks for the recommendation. I will give that a try. 🙂
This was super helpful. I have a new deep freeze and I have been thinking I need to get a few more things stored away before winter!
Oh good Helene, a new freezer how fun! 🙂 I just pulled out some frozen corn and carrots to use in a soup last night. It was so nice to have them already cut and ready to throw in! (not to mention knowing they were fresh when I froze them)
We bought a seven cubic foot chest freezer last year and are still congratulating ourselves on our brilliance. Here are some hard-earned tips. Label everything or you wind up with UFO’s — Unidentified Frozen Objects. Date everything so you can rotate old to new. Keep an up to date inventory of what’s in there. You think you’ll remember. Trust me, you won’t.
Great tips! We love our freezer too. And UFOs- LOL!
Thanks — my girls are in 4-H and these tips are helpful because some of them are taking food preservation as a project. My oldest LOVES frozen grapes!
Oh perfect Susan! My kiddos just asked for frozen grapes yesterday (to “officially” kick off summer).
How long can you keep them frozen?
We like to put a little bit of powdered jello over our grapes after they have been washed before we freeze them… leave a little water on the grapes for the jello to stick to and then freeze… We call them glitter grapes(I have two girls) they are also known as sour patch grapes.
Oh my goodness, how fun! I love this! Thanks so much for sharing Lillian!
I prep and freeze sautéed mushrooms and caramelized onions. I also brown hamburger and onions together and bag in standard cooking measures like 1-2 cups. Then when I need a fast meal it’s precooked. I also precook bacon. Anything to keep from throwing away food that goes bad in the frig. Found you can zest citrus and juice them and freezer in ice cube trays.
That’s a great tip to Suzie. I also do this- sometimes called batch cooking. Here’s a way that I make the ground beef prep even easier… https://missiontosave.com/cook-ground-beef-crock-pot-freeze-later/