Drying or Freezing home-grown herbs
Have a lot of flat leaf parsley, rosemary and thyme that I grew in my garden in Chicagoland. It is still growing strong, but I can feel the season will be ending soon.
Looking for ideas, techniques to have it available during the winter.
Thanks!
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7 Comments:
I prefer to freeze my herbs minced and then covered in water and frozen in ice cubes. For lots of applications I can then just throw an ice cube into the dish. There will be some applications where you don't want the extra water and can let the cube thaw first. I find it works best to underfill the ice cube and then come back and add another layer of water on to of the herbs, as many protrude from the ice cube when you first freeze it.
I just keep a bag of ice cubes for each herb. Works well for parsley and dill. I usually freeze my basil as pesto. I try to keep rosemary and thyme growing in pots. They don't thrive for me inside, but I still like to have something fresh.
lemonfair at 1:25PM on 09/06/09
Alton Brown covered this in an episode of Good Eats.
The important thing he mentioned was blanching them before attempting to dry or freeze, as to remove as much of the yucky stuff as possible.
missvenuz at 1:34PM on 09/06/09
I froze thyme and oregano perfectly successfully. I simply washed them well and then wrapped them up tightly in paper towels & plastic wrap. I then stored the bundles in plastic containers or bags in the freezer. When I want some, I just unwrapped my little herby packages and took what I wanted.
They lasted for months and months.
I'm not sure I'd do the same for parsley. It's cheap enough that I'd rather buy it fresh anyway. I have no idea about dill because I've never managed to grow it.
RegrettableFoodie at 3:51PM on 09/06/09
I've been doing what Lemonfair does for years. Works for me.
goodcooker at 3:54PM on 09/06/09
I have taken to using the Alton Brown herb dehydrator, it consists of a few bungee cords, a 19 inch box fan and a few furnace filters. Works great with no extra water. Google Alton Brown herb dehydrator. I dry my own herbs every year and always have enough to last the winter. Good luck!
Pavlov at 9:45PM on 09/06/09
if it's basil leaves, i'll clean and dry and just stick them in a little plastic bag, double wrap.... freeze. if i'm being really lazy or in a hurry, i'll just throw the whole stalk (basil, rosemary, thyme, etc) cleaned, dried into a plastic bag, or wrapped with saran - double bagged. the idea is to keep them from getting freezer burn. dill or cilantro, if i have extra chopped, i put it into little plastic containers and freeze. it's great pulling out a clump of herbs in january and cooking with them.
i've also heard of layering with salt, keeping them in a jar. i've never tried this..... so i can't vouch for it.
pooch at 10:54AM on 09/07/09
I dry mine in the oven on the lowest possible setting for about an hour or two until dry, then I take the leaves off and put them in jars
I'm thinking @lemonfair's suggestion comes out with a fresher taste though.
yayfood at 8:41PM on 09/07/09