Now is the time to save the sweetest, tastiest vegetables for winter. Here are tricks, tips and advice on how to freeze them for vitamins and colour.
We have one month to prepare for the colder weather. Cooks need to think about the red fruit ragu alongside their winter brownies, and making sure their broth tastes just as good in winter with the peppers and tomatoes they've saved. There are a lot of misconceptions and misleading methods about freezing, but let's clear up the good and not-so-good methods.
Which fruits can be frozen?
Mostly anything can be put on the ice, but there is a significant difference when they melt. A warts without their seeds, in vacuum bags, they keep their texture and colour very well. It is undeniable that their vitamin content drops below 50% after freezing, but it is much better than not eating any fruit at all during these months. Their uses will vary, but making fruit cakes, cooking soups, filling stews or tarts is the perfect way to add vitamins and variety to your meals any time of the year.
What is the best way to freeze vegetables?
The majority of restaurants have a blast chiller, i.e. a blast freezer. This is the best way to preserve the texture of the ingredients and their vitamin content. It doesn't suck the water out of them, but shocks them to a similar consistency as when they went into the freezer. However, for classic -20, -18°C freezers, it is advisable to blanch them beforehand. This means that the vegetables Dip suddenly into salted boiling water and then straight into an icy, wet bowl. The icy water stops the vegetables from cooking, but they are ready to freeze and the frost no longer penetrates the fibres. It is worth putting the soup ingredients or vegetables for garnish in the vacuum bag and then into the freezer using this method. However, this does not apply to most fruit.
Vegetables that are worth freezing: corn, cauliflower, broccoli, green peas, butter beans, asparagus, carrots, kale, celery, kohlrabi, parsley root, Brussels sprouts, peppers.
Rush for the freezer boxes
Both housewives and most of the population quickly realised that, in addition to canning, freezing is a great way to harvest. For years now, freezer boxes have been hard to find in shops since mid-summer, and even then you have to wait. Apart from jam making and barrel pickling, the only thing of greater value now is frozen vegetables, which you won't have to buy in the shop. But it is restaurants, as well as housewives, who can now make real savings by stocking their freezers with large quantities of tasty vegetables at a good price.
Did you know? Green spices and herbs are also frozen. They are put between baking paper and then in the freezer. When it's frozen, it's ready to go in the vacuum bags.#
