Category: Freezing

Image of pumpkins of various sizes and colors on a wood floor.

Preserving Pumpkin Puree

It’s June and, before preserving season is in full swing with produce coming in from the garden, it’s time to take care of any pumpkins and winter squash left over from last year’s harvest! The National Center for Home Food Preservation does not recommend canning pumpkin puree because of potential density issues, so how else can we preserve pumpkin? By dehydrating and freezing it!

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Dehydrating Pumpkin Puree

Dehydrating pumpkin puree is my favorite way to preserve it because I use it to make my Pumpkin Bars In a Jar and because it rehydrates just like canned puree! It’s also a great way to save your freezer space for other things.

All you need to dehydrate pumpkin puree is an oven, an immersion blender (or regular blender or food processor), a dehydrator, and a food processor! I use a 6-tray Cosori dehydrator and absolutely love it!

Here’s a quick run-through of the dehydrating process! First, bake the pumpkin until cooked through. Then, puree the pumpkin with a blender or immersion blender and cook down until you reach your desired consistency. Then, spread on fruit leather sheets and dehydrate at 125 degrees Fahrenheit in a dehydrator for 10-12 hours. To tell if the pumpkin is properly dehydrated, bend a corner of the pumpkin sheet. If it breaks, it’s finished. If it does not break, continue dehydrating until it is completely dehydrated. Using a food processor, process the pumpkin until it is a powder or very small pieces. Store in a mason jar.

Freezing Pumpkin Puree

This is the fastest and easiest way to preserve pumpkin puree. All you need to freeze puree is an oven, an immersion blender (or regular blender or food processor), and a freezer!

I also recommend these stands that hold reusable or disposable freezer bags open so you can fill them more easily.

Rehydrating Pumpkin Puree

To rehydrate pumpkin puree, the water-to-pumpkin ratio is 4:1. So, if you want about one cup of pumpkin puree, you would combine 1 cup of water and 1/4 cup of pumpkin puree powder. You can add more water if you want a thinner consistency or less water if you want a thicker consistency.

Pureeing Pumpkin Instructions

  1. Preheat oven to 375 degrees Fahrenheit.
  2. While oven is preheating, cut pumpkin in half and scoop out seeds.
  3. Cut pumpkin into pieces that will fit on your baking tray(s).
  4. Put pumpkin onto trays with skin-side up and put trays into oven.
  5. Bake for 45 minutes or until pumpkin is tender.
  6. Remove from oven and let cool until it is cool enough to touch.
  7. If there is any water in the baking trays, drain it off.
  8. Remove skin from pumpkin. It should peel off, but, if it doesn’t, you can use a spoon or a knife to separate the skin from the pumpkin flesh.
  9. Add baked and peeled pumpkin to a large bowl or stock pot.
  10. Using an immersion blender, blender, or food processor, blend pumpkin until it is the consistency of pumpkin puree.
  11. If you would like the pumpkin puree to be thicker, cook it over medium high heat, stirring constantly, until it reaches your desired consistency.

Dehydrating Pumpkin Puree Instructions

  1. Fill fruit leather trays that fit your dehydrator with pumpkin puree.
  2. Make sure the pumpkin puree is spread evenly on the trays.
  3. Dehydrate at 125 degrees Fahrenheit for 10-12 hours.
  4. After 10-12 hours, check the pumpkin puree for dryness.
  5. If the dehydrated puree doesn’t snap when it is broken, put the trays back in and continue dehydrating at 125 degrees Fahrenheit for 2-hour periods until completely dehydrated.

    6. Powdering Pumpkin Puree Instructions

  6. Once the puree is completely dehydrated, break it into smaller pieces that will fit in your food processor.
  7. Process until the puree turns into a powder or smaller pieces.
  8. Store puree in a mason jar, turning every day for 5-7 days to ensure there are no clumps of pumpkin puree.
  9. If your puree is clumping, it’s a sign that the pumpkin puree might not have dehydrated completely. Spread the puree pieces on a dehydrating tray and dehydrate again until completely dehydrated.

    10. Rehydrating Pumpkin Puree Powder Instructions

  10. In a 4:1 ratio, combine warm water and pumpkin puree powder. For example, if you want to rehydrate 1 cup of pumpkin puree, add 1 cup of water to 1/4 cup pumpkin puree powder.
  11. Use as you would use pumpkin puree.

Freezing Pumpkin Puree Instructions

  1. Label reusable or disposable freezer bags with the name of what you’re freezing and the date you’re freezing it.
  2. Put the desired amount of pumpkin puree into reusable or disposable freezer bags.
  3. Flatten out, ensuring as much air as possible is pushed out of the freezer bag.
  4. Freeze until ready to use.
An image of frozen peas, corn, and carrots.

How to Use Up Vegetables in Soup Mix Freezer Bags

We’ve all been there… We’ve all had the best intentions of meal prepping or eating healthier and then either never started or only used half the veggies we bought. The rest sat in the refrigerator until they were either going bad or were beyond the point of saving, and we had to throw them out. Well, I have the perfect solution for how to use up veggies that will not only save time later but will help you eat healthier too!

You can use these to make my staple “chicken” noodle soup recipe or this delicious curry soup!

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Soup Mix Bags

When my celery is starting to wilt and my mushrooms have been sitting in the refrigerator way too long, I gather all of the vegetables in my refrigerator, take out my food processor, and get to work making soup mix bags! It only takes a few minutes, and then I have bags of vegetables ready to pull out of the freezer any time I’m hungry for soup. If you don’t have a food processor, you can cut your vegetables by hand. It will just take a little longer.

Items Needed to Make Soup Mix Bags

You don’t need anything fancy to make these soup mix bags, but there are a couple of items that make creating these soup mix bags much easier!

First, I love reducing waste by utilizing reusable, resealable freezer bags. These are my favorite!

I also recommend these stands that hold reusable or disposable freezer bags open so you can fill them more easily!

This is the food processor I use as well. It has an 8-cup capacity and is a great option on a budget!

What Vegetables Work?

The great news is that these soup mix bags are customizable to what you like to eat in your soup and what you happen to have in your refrigerator! My favorite combination just contains the staples I use in almost every soup I make–carrots, celery, bell peppers, onion, garlic, and mushrooms.

Below is a comprehensive list of vegetables that freeze well and that you could include in your soup mix bags:

  • Carrots
  • Celery
  • Bell peppers
  • Onions
  • Mushrooms
  • Corn
  • Broccoli
  • Zucchini
  • Green beans

Vegetables With Special Preparation

Mushrooms will need to be fully cooked before freezing, while zucchini and green beans will all need to be blanched.

Instructions

  1. Wash all vegetables and peel the vegetables that need peeled.
  2. If any vegetables require special preparation, like pre-cooking or blanching, complete that preparation and set the vegetables aside to cool.
  3. Using a food processor with the slicing plate attached, slice the remaining vegetables you would like to use in your soup mix bags.
  4. Evenly divide the vegetables into reusable sandwich bags.
  5. Store in freezer for 4-6 months.
  6. When you’re ready to cook, simply take bag out of freezer and dump vegetables into hot pan.
  7. Allow to thaw and then cook to desired doneness.
  8. Continue with soup recipe.
Image of braided garlic.

The Easiest Way to Preserve Garlic

With the pickled garlic recipe by Ball rumored as unsafe, garlic preservation methods are somewhat limited. If you’re someone who only follows by-the-book, safe, and tested preservation methods (which I do), you need options! Preserving garlic in oil and honey have been popular, but those methods pose botulism poisoning risks. That’s why, this year, I took advantage of some extra freezer space to preserve garlic that is ready-to-sauté! It only took a few minutes of prep work and an overnight stay in the freezer. After breaking the cubes apart, I have garlic ready to go anytime I need to toss some minced garlic in a dish!

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How to Mince Garlic

If you’re planning on freezing a large batch of garlic, it is time-consuming to hand-mince it all with a knife. Using a food processing is faster, if you have one. However, I prefer to use my OXO Good Grips Garlic Press. Part of the reason I love this method is because I can save the leftover garlic “shell” for my stock bag, which I freeze to make stock with at a later time!

Preserve Garlic in the Freezer

After the garlic is minced, put it all in a sandwich bag or mince it directly into the bag like in the video below by purchasing these holders. I prefer to use reusable bags, like these, but I was worried about removing the garlic smell afterwards. You’ll seal the bag, flatten the garlic, and then use a chopstick or some other long, cylindrical kitchen tool to separate the garlic into squares. Freeze overnight, break apart, and store in the same sandwich bag!

Using Preserved, Frozen Garlic

Using your preserved garlic is as easy as pulling one or two cubes out as needed–no need to thaw! They taste great in soups, stir fries, and pasta sauces!