Keeping notes on frozen food
Careful notes are the
key to freezer success. I keep each type of food segregated in
the freezer and draw a map so that I can find things easily.
Since I clean out the freezer entirely every spring and freeze in clear
plastic containers, I don't even need to label my produce.
I do keep a very careful list of how much of each vegetable I've
frozen, though. Using a piece of graph paper, I list the name of
each vegetable at the top, then hash off a square for each cup, pint,
quart, or gallon (depending on the food) as I throw the day's produce
in the freezer. Once winter comes and I start pulling food out, I
cross off the squares for food I've used. That way I have a quick
visual estimate of what I'm getting low on and don't end up eating all
of the green beans in December and ignoring the summer squash until
February.
This year, I'm finally starting to get a handle on how much of each
type of vegetable I should freeze. I've included a table below
with my goals for this year --- keep in mind that you probably like
some vegetables more or less than we do and that this is for two
people. The container size listed is a good size to provide one
meal for the two of us. (Some vegetables, like summer squash,
become much smaller when they thaw.) You'll notice my table has
very little information on fruit since our fruit hasn't really come
into production yet.
| Food |
Container
size |
No.
of containers |
| Greens
(mixed) |
quart |
30 |
| Strawberries |
pint |
infinite |
| Shelling
peas |
cup |
25 |
| Snow
peas |
cup |
15 |
| Summer
squash (mixed) |
quart |
45 |
| Broccoli |
pint |
25 |
| Pesto |
cup |
35 |
| Green
beans |
pint |
60 |
| Blackberries |
pint |
infinite |
| Applesauce |
cup |
25 |
| Corn |
pint |
25 |
| Cabbage |
cup |
30 |
| Spaghetti
sauce |
pint |
15 |
| Pizza
sauce |
pint |
20 |
| Whole
tomatoes |
gallon |
15 |
| Winter
squash (roasted and mashed) |
pint |
10 |
| Okra |
pint |
25 |
| This post is part of our Introduction to Farm Freezing lunchtime
series. Read all of the entries: |
Or explore more posts by date or by subject.
About us: Anna Hess and Mark Hamilton spent over a decade living self-sufficiently in the mountains of Virginia before moving north to start over from scratch in the foothills of Ohio. They've experimented with permaculture, no-till gardening, trailersteading, home-based microbusinesses and much more, writing about their adventures in both blogs and books.
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I'm curious why you clean your freezer in the spring rather than once the new food starts coming in?
Not that I mind, one bit, having the old stuff show up at my house. Enjoyed some corn just yesterday!
Hello Anna,
In your experience, what has been the best container for freezing? Heavy-duty zip-loc-style bags, plastic tupperwares, something else?
Wayde