You can freeze just about anything, but there are just some things that won’t taste good pickled or turned into a jam. That’s why there are so many different methods of food preservation when you’re a gardener. In the articles below, we cover lots of food preservation basics and the specifics of preserving various fruits, herbs, and vegetables.
Unfortunately, there are just as many ways to improperly store and spoil your vegetables as there are ways to preserve them.
For example, did you know you should not store white or sweet potatoes in the fridge? The cold can injure them. You also shouldn’t store them with fruit. Gas from the fruit makes potatoes sprout. And unless you’re cooking, keep your potatoes away from onions; the two in close proximity will make the potatoes sprout.
Or how about storing corn? Once the ear leaves the stalk, the corn starts converting its sugar to starch. The longer you wait to cook and eat it, the more it will taste like grocery store corn rather than fresh-picked. If you store it in the refrigerator, you have about a week.
And did you realize that berries need moisture to stay crisp? If you pick a few bushels of strawberries or blueberries, it’s a good idea to rinse them before storing them because the moisture will keep them plump longer. Blueberries can last over a month in a device like a berry box, which allows you to rinse the blueberries and keep them in a strainer inside an air-tight box, which keeps the berries crisp without sitting in water.
And we haven’t even gotten to our posts on canning, freezing, making jams, and all the ways you can preserve vegetables for the much longer-term so you don’t have to risk storage spoilage.
In the articles below, you’ll learn about everything from canning apples to freezing squash, storing potatoes, and drying herbs. We welcome you to also read our Recipes from Your Garden freebie. Enjoy!
When I think about preserving sage, the first thing that comes to my mind is how I’ll cook with it. Dried sage has a more concentrated (read: delicious) taste when it’s dried than when it’s fresh, and it’s tasty with pork, sausages, poultry, and in stuffing.
Fresh apples are divine but what if you can’t eat them fast enough? At room temperature, fresh apples will last about a week. Then they start to get bruised and mealy. Stored in the fridge, apples will keep for about a month or two depending on the variety.
National Canning Day was on October 23rd and it isn’t your grandma’s canning anymore. No more wax on the jams and jellies which that was my job when I was little and more importantly there are steps to make sure your preserved goods are safe! I always tell people that cleanliness is next to Godliness […]
Squash gets overlooked for its versatility and overall yum-factor when it comes to garden vegetables (okay, technically a fruit). Always a bridesmaid, squash is often relegated to “side dish material,” and the general public doesn’t give it a second thought. But we’re not the general public. We’re gardeners and we know how amazing squash is!
I get it. You worked hard on preserving those fresh garden veggies, and you’re looking forward to enjoying them on a cold, dark winter evening. You pull a glass jar from your pantry, and you notice the signs of food spoilage. It’s disappointing. If the spoilage isn’t too evident, you might even be tempted to […]
There’s something special about growing pounds and pounds of your favorite vegetables. It makes every meal feel like a celebration when you have heirloom tomatoes, fresh basil, crunchy cucumbers, and sweet peppers on your plate. As much as I love to cook, however, there are only so many veggies I can eat or share before they go bad.
When it comes to buying or picking apples, I always end up with way more than I actually need. The giant basket of apples taunts me from my countertop, knowing that I will never get through them fast enough before they start to go bad. Freezing fresh apples is one way of keeping them from going bad, but I also love pressure canning apples and storing them in my pantry for later use in pies, breads, apple butter, and apple sauce.
We’re a pretty easy-going bunch here at Food Gardening Network. Heck, we get to grow vegetables and cook and write about it. What’s not to enjoy? But there is one thing that we are very serious about: food safety. And that, my friend, is why I want to address how to safely preserve vegetables in […]
I’m sure some people believe it’s ridiculous to think about ways to preserve jalapeños and other hot peppers. Why wouldn’t you just eat them fresh? Add jalapeños to your pizza. Use habaneros in your fresh salsa. Get that awesome curry heated up with some Thai hot peppers.
Hooray! You Pumpkin-Spice-latte’d your way through your own apple trees and/or every apple orchard in town and found yourself barricaded in your kitchen with no less than 20 pounds of apples. You already baked everything in your recipe book and your family can’t eat another apple pie, crumble, sauce, or turnover.
