About a year ago I started to change the way I thought about life. I wanted to live more self sustaining. I wanted to be able to be more self sufficient, and not have to always be so dependent on the grocery store. Over the year this has changed and grown. The biggest change I have noticed is the way I view food. Before I bought most of my food pre-made, pre-prepackaged full of chemical additives, food dyes and preservatives. Now most of the food that is eaten at this house is home made from scratch. I know exactly what is going into my kiddos tummies, the few convience (sp??) foods I do buy are mostly organic and the label is well read by me!
This summer I planted a big garden (not as big as some, but big for me, I would love to have more land and do even more) and we have mostly eaten out of it for the last few months. Sunday I had my in-laws over for dinner, the only thing that didn’t come out of my garden was the pot-roast, potatoes and rolls (I did bake the rolls from wheat I ground myself). It was a wonderful meal and it felt so good to be able to provide so well for my family.
I find myself thinking about food preservation. My great-grandmothers spent a lot of time preserving food for the winter. I am hoping to be more like that. As I was contemplating my garden and trying to reduce waste, my thoughts turned to Zucchini. Any one who has ever grown a zucchini plants knows that they produce like crazy! Typically my family would eat a little zucchini here and there, maybe I would make some zucchini bread and the rest would go to waste. It occurred to me that I wasn’t being a very thankful daughter to waste all the wonderful, good food I was being blessed with. So this year I stared freezing and preserving my harvest.
The easiest way to preserve Zucchini and Summer Squash is to grate it all up and freeze it in baggies.
I freeze two cups at a time in the baggies, that is how much my recipe of Zucchini bread calls for.
(Isn’t this a cute Summer Squash, there are so many varieties.)
To freeze Summer Squash I cut it all up. I try to make them all the same size so it will cook evenly.
evenly…is that a word???
I put it in my steaming pan (I know there is a “real word” for this pan, I just can think of it) and I steam the Zucchini for 3 minutes. It doesn’t need to be cooked all the way, just give it a quick steam bath. You can boil it in water for about 2 minutes. I like the steam method best, the veggies don’t get as wet.
When it is done steaming plunge the veggies into ice water to stop the cooking (that is if you are going to do this properly, I get a little lazy and just run in under cold water). Then I dump them all out on a clean towel to dry for about 5-10 minuets.
After they have dried a little I spread them all out on a cookies sheet lined with wax paper and slide the whole thing in the freezer.
This is called flash freezing, this is so the individual pieces freeze and don’t clump together in a big ice block, it helps keep freezer burn at bay.
Once they are frozen, after about a few hours, I take them out and put them in old Tupperware containers, anything will work, even zip-lock baggies. I just like the Tupperware (these are old freezer jam containers I had laying around) I think they stack better.
Pop those puppies in the freezer and you will have home grown, picked at the peak of freshness veggies all winter long.
All that for only the cost of seed, time and some Tupperware/baggies.
head on over to Tammy’s Recipes for more Kitchen Tip Tuesday
You’re doing great! And yes evenly is a word, at least in my language it is! lol
I have also felt the same strong urge to be more self-sufficient (as far as my small suburban yard can take me). Your zuchini looks fab!
Speaking of zuchini bread… Thanks it is way yummy!
You amaze me!!
I freeze my shredded zucchini too.
It's a good thing, because believe it or not, our zucchini crop FAILED this year. I got maybe 7 zucchini out of 8 plants.
That is unheard of!!!!
I don't know what happened.
Everything else is producing or OVER producing. 🙂
I'm glad I have shredded zucchini in the freezer!
I'll have to start blanching & freezing like you do too.
Nice tip! 🙂
My z/s didn’t do well. A mildew hit. I didn’t spray early enough.
Just happened upon your blog–what a nice place to be!
Thank you Tara
I use the shredded then frozen zuchini ‘juice’ that I squeeze out to keep my breads from being too wet is saved in my stock pot in the freezer! Never waste any that delicious flavor! Any leftover bits of any kind of squash or pumpkin or other vegies are added to my stockpot in the freezer, as the soup cooks it just adds body to soup base and my picky eaters never know they are eating the dreaded leftover vegies but everyone raves about how flavorful they always are!