Hello and Good day everyone!
Today I want to talk about some simple preservation and kitchen scrap tips. With having an interest in sustainability, low waste, eco friendly and growing food for my family it just makes sense to know how to store produce for long term, convenient use and to make the most of my crops and groceries.
I had a few carrots and celery bags I picked up this week for varied food use and figured I'd do a lil post today on one of the ways I preserve carrots.
I don't have a pressure canner, or else I'd make some half pints and pints of carrots for the pantry. Instead I make do with what I have~ which is a freezer, dehydrator, or pickling.
Today im going to focus on freezer method.
You'll wanna take your carrots and wash 'em up. You can let them dry after wash up but its not strictly necessary.
Chop of both ends of the carrot. You can peel your carrots too if desired (save all these bits for later soup stock or to give to your chickens or compost piles) if you have nice leafy greens on your carrots, you can use those greens similar to parsley or as a salad additive. (Chickens enjoy them as well!)
For freezing carrots you'll want to blanch them first.
Blanching is just taking a pot of water, bringing ro a rolling boil and dumping raw veggies in (like carrots, green beans, broccoli spinich, sweet potato greens) the veggies will often go from a almost matte color to a brighter color when ready. It's suggested across media that about 5-10 minutes is enough.
Drain the carrots from the hot water and give them an ice bath (I usually don't have ice so I soak and rinse a few times to bring down the heat in the veggies)
I let the carrots drain and dry a bit, when dry I spread a towel over my baking pan, layer out a layer of carrot, popped it in the freezer.
When frozen, I pull the towel up, roll the carrots round a bit to break any that may be together apart and pack them in the storage container and pop them back into the freezer till needed.
That's it for today's post, short and simple :)
For more preservation ideas check out the links below
https://nchfp.uga.edu/how/can_04/carrots_sliced.html
https://www.bbcgoodfood.com/howto/guide/how-to-freeze-carrots
https://nchfp.uga.edu/how/can_06/pickled_carrots.html
🥕🌱Happy homesteading! 🌱🥕
8 21 2023