Agriculture Reference
In-Depth Information
Freezing Tips and Tricks
Often, a large part of putting food away when you have it available, to use at a later time, is having
an extra freezer on hand. While it may seem like an expensive investment, especially with the
energy costs of maintaining the freezer, the numbers look pretty favorable! We bought our chest
freezer for about $400 and it will last 15 years. A monthly energy cost is projected to be less than
$10 per month. This means our yearly cost is less than $140 for the cost of the machine and the
energy costs combined. It would be almost impossible not to save $140 per year on your grocery
bills using a deep freeze.
Chest-style freezers are more energy efficient than the stand-up units because the cold air does not
pour out of the freezer every time you open the door. It is also cheaper to maintain a freezer that is
full than it is to maintain a freezer that is empty. So if you have it, use it!
We have a gas generator as a backup for our freezer in case of a power outage. If your power does
go out, do not open the freezer door. Your food will stay cold for up to two days. After that you
risk losing some of the frozen foods, especially the foods near the top and edges of the freezer.
When we are low on meat or vegetables to freeze, I will sometimes prepare large batches of meals
and freeze them precooked. We also buy staples like wheat for grinding into fresh flour, and rice, in
bulk for the deeper discounts, and storing some of this in the freezer when there is room allows us
to keep them bug free and keep the freezer full at the same time.
Freezing vegetables instead of canning them keeps them more fresh-tasting than canned vegetables.
But of course, the trade-off is that frozen vegetables don't last as long as canned vegetables do.
Many crops have to be partially cooked in boiling water, a method called blanching, to slow down
the enzymatic processes of the produce.
Freezing can change the texture of the fruits and vegetables you freeze, as well as causing some
discoloration. You can coat fruit with a mixture of ascorbic acid and water, or water mixed with
salt, before freezing to help prevent browning. Freezing items as quickly as possible can also help
minimize the cellular changes that happen when the items freeze.
When you freeze food, I've found it best to prepare the fruits or vegetables first: peeling them,
chopping them, removing stems, leaves, or pits, etc. You can freeze food items in single-use por-
tions so they will be close at hand when cooking.
Alternatively, you can freeze the vegetable items on a flat cookie sheet and when they are frozen,
put them into a larger container. By doing that your frozen produce won't stick together in one big
clump. This works especially well with berries.
If you are freezing liquids like sauces or soup stock, you can freeze them in gallon-size, zipper-lock
storage bags placed inside plastic containers. This will allow the liquid to freeze in a flat, easily
stackable shape. When the liquid is frozen, you can remove the containers and stack the bags in the
 
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