Tuesday Tip | Freeze your greens
Amazon links are affiliate links.
I've mentioned this in passing before, but I thought it deserved a little highlight.
So.
If you have too much kale, spinach, or any green-smoothie-friendly green, throw it in the freezer before it goes bad.
The freezer extends the useful life of the greens by a long shot, and you can take the frozen greens straight from freezer to blender.
I know some people blend up their greens with a little water and freeze the green mixture into cubes.
And I did try that. But it was more work for no particular benefit, in my opinion.
Now I just wash the greens, spin them in my salad spinner,
and put them into a bag.
I put the bag in the freezer, and then I'm good to go! The greens get fairly brittle when they're frozen, so there's no need to do anything fancy to keep them from sticking together.
Obviously, this tip is no good for greens you want to use in raw applications, such as a salad (hello, soggy greens!).
But for green smoothies, it works like a charm.
And I find it to be especially useful for fresh spinach, which seems to have a fridge life of about 10 seconds post-opening.
P.S. I use an Oxo salad spinner (had it since 2011, use it all the time).
P.P.S. If you want to get into green smoothie making, especially with tough greens like kale, a good blender is very, very helpful. I have the Vitamix 5200, which I love, and which Cook's Illustrated recommends highly. I wrote all about my Vitamix here.
P.P.S. I blend up the greens with a room temp banana and some yogurt before I add any frozen fruit. That way you can completely puree the greens. If you add greens with the frozen fruit, you'll have a much harder time getting them blended up.
Love this trick, it has saved me some food waste over the years!! My kids LOVE "green eggs" (I take frozen-to-extend-life greens and add them to eggs with a little milk, immersion blender them and cook them like regular scrambled eggs). I love getting my 4.5 & 2.5 year old excited about power greens ; )
Oh, that's a good idea! I add spinach to my scrambled eggs,but I never thought about blending the spinach in.
Mine, too 🙂
Jen, that’s brilliant. I just might convert my kids to liking veggies in their eggs with this trick!
That is such a great idea, thank you for sharing
The best method I have found for keeping it fresh is to wash it, spin it, let it air dry, then store it in an airtight container on a double layer of kitchen paper towel & if it's a large quantity another layer of paper towel sitting over the top. I find my spinach lasts the whole week & sometimes longer this way.
I can’t think of any other way to phrase this, but it is meant as a legitimate question not a rude remark! But, what is the point of the salad spinner? Does it extend the life of the greens maybe? I haven’t quite figured it out but you’re “notorious” for not having extra non-essential gear so I must be missing something I need! Haha!
Ah, it's for drying greens after you wash them. I always wonder how people get by without one! How do you get your greens nice and dry after giving them a bath? I feel like I'd be having watery salads all the time.
It's also a handy way to store greens in the fridge without them getting too wet/slimy, as the strainer basket keeps the greens elevated.
It's not the first tool I'd choose to have on a desert island or anything, but I like it enough that it earns its place in my not-that-large kitchen.
Good to know!
Thank you! I knew you’d have a legitimate reason 😉
Wow, I should buy one of those OXO spinners! I think it's the main reason my made-at-home salads aren't as good as ones from restaurants. I don't have a salad spinner and my lettuce is too watery.
Alternately, if you're just too lazy to dig the salad spinner out of its place in the furthest reaches of the hard-to-get-to cupboard, lay out a clean flour sack towel, lay the greens on it, gather the edges together and run really fast outside so that you don't drip on the floor. . . then fling it around really fast so water flies everywhere. I find the "pitcher winding up" motion best, but if you just want to get dizzy, have fun twirling about. Please don't let go of the edges of the towel, or you will no longer be having salad for supper.
The "run really fast outside" part doesn't sound at all lazy to me!
How do people get the greens dry without them? I put them in a designated pillowcase and kinda do a fun little spin with them in there. It really gets them pretty dry. It was a tip I heard from Martha Stewart years ago. Frugal, takes up little space and effective. I've just had too many salad spinners break really quickly on me. Bad experiences. The pillowcase works fine and won't break.
I get rid of things all the time, but love my salad spinner too!! I love salad but can't handle eating wet leaves. I also prepare leaves in advance that way - I get big heads of romaine or leaf lettuce, chop, wash, and spin them - then put them in Tupperware. It lasts so much longer that way, and there is less food waste because I can always make a salad in seconds, or grab a handful of leaves to go on a sandwich, and I don't waste it. Prepared produce never is wasted in my house, but unprepared can be, so I make produce prep a priority. Broccoli, berries, whatever.
That's definitely a great way to preserve fruit and veggies. I do that with strawberries a lot since they go bad so fast!
I've frozen avocados, spinach, and kale before. But I later found that the freezing altered the taste quite a bit 🙁
Yeah, I've seen ideas to freeze avocado before and have wondered if it really turns out ok to use in a sandwich
Also good for soups and casseroles. I made Zuppa Toscana this weekend with kale I had frozen. We are a small family of 3 and can’t get through the big bags of greens while they are still fresh.
I usually buy loose spinach leaves so I can just buy the quantity I want, it's also much cheaper than the pre-packaged spinach in Australia
I took a healthy eating class and the RD teaching the class suggested dumping spinach or bagged salad onto napkins or paper towels, then resealing in the bag or a plastic container with a lid (salad spinner would probably work.) The towels/napkins absorb the moisture and extends the life a few days. Works great. Colored or printed paper products are not recommended.
I keep meaning to do this! We've started buying frozen spinach but I'm sure this method is much cheaper - and prevents food waste. 🙂
The thing with buying already frozen though, do you know if it's actually washed as good as you would wash it at home? I always wonder that when I'm using it.
Except for lettuce, I never eat greens raw (it's not a good idea if you have thyroid issues). But I do freeze them like this, and then use them in cooked dishes like soups and stews.
Thank you - I have to try that!
Lol spinach does have the worst shelf life!! Does freezing work for stir fry spinach?
a thought about making your greens last longer. When I buy spinach (it's usually in one of those semi-hard plastic 'boxes'), I immediately open it and place a dry paper towel on top. then when I put it in the fridge, I put the container up-side-down so that any moisture travels through gravity to the paper towel. Each time I use the spinach (lettuce/any greens), if the paper towel is damp, I replace with a dry one and again, put in fridge up-side down. This really extends the life of greens. Raspberries are also one of those fruits that go down fast, but when I brought my last batch home, first it got a bath in a 1 part vinegar to 10 parts water bath. Then into a rectangular plastic container....paper towel on top, upside in fridge. Changed towel when damp...my raspberries lasted TWELVE DAYS!!!!! Lest you think I am profligate with my paper towels...I usually have 2 going...damp one gets hung on oven door handle while dry once gets put in greens box. If greens in a bag, put towel along one side of bag and make sure that side is DOWN against shelf in fridge.
Profligate! High five for the perfect word.
(Not meaning I think you are profligate but that I think you have a very accurate vocabulary!)
I'm not a smoothie person, but there are some good ideas for making greens and berries last longer here! Thanks!
Kristen, try putting your banana and yogurt in the vitamix first, then layer your greens and finally frozen strawberries. I find this allows the blender to purify before it get's too bogged down by the large fruit. I do add a liquid as well though so it has more flow.
Greens are so easy to grow in my garden, but I can't keep up on eating them in the summer. Last summer I tried freezing them and have enjoyed adding them to soups and smoothies all winter long!
I freeze kale and spinach on sale, wash in the salad spinner and use in soups.
I learned last summer that broccoli greens are edible, and good thing because I had a lot of them and only about an inch of broccoli. I froze a LOT, and chop it up into soups.
I also have a lot of kale in my freezer, and I found its good where spinach is good, but I have to cook it longer.
My 99 cent only store( in Socal) gets big bags of Earthbound farms power greens(1.00) and I blanch and squeeze out all the water and then freeze in a cereal bag( thanks for that tip) for spinach artichoke dip.
Thanks for the tip about blending your greens first when making a smoothie. I tried it this morning and it worked like a charm! I then added the rest of my ingredients and my blender didn't sound like it was "grinding" as much.
Oh, I'm so glad that it helped!
Great Tips I hate wasting food
Thank you for this!
I found it because I was going to make them in ice cube trays, this is so much easier!
Nothing to clean too!
Can you tell I'm excited? LOL 🙂