How to freeze carrots
Are you often struggling to finish an entire bag of carrots before they begin to rot in the bottom of your fridge? Do you tend to throw away the stragglers? Do you chuck the floppy, lifeless ones into stews and soups? If the answer is yes, then this is the advice for you.
Carrots are so simple to freeze if you follow the advice below, so prevent food waste and always have vibrant and tasty carrots to hand.
It might be tempting to chuck your raw carrots into the freezer as is, however, in order to lock in and preserve taste, colour and nutrients, it's important to blanch them first.
Can you freeze raw carrots without blanching?
We'd strongly recommend you blanch your carrots first, as they have a high water content doing so ensures they stay crisp and crunchy when defrosted. Make sure your carrots are looking crisp and blemish free. We don't recommend freezing carrots that are past their best. Bear in mind, when you freeze something, you get out what you put in. Freezing won't improve the quality of the ingredient!
- Peel your carrots, chop them into manageable/useful sized pieces and cook them in boiling water for 3-5min, depending on the size.
- Drain them well and then plunge them into ice cold water to quickly stop the cooking process. Drain them well again and pat dry using a clean tea towel or kitchen roll.
- Once dry, space apart on a baking sheet lined with baking parchment and freeze. Once frozen (around 2hr), remove to a freezer bag or air tight container and freeze.
How do you store carrots in the freezer for a long time?
Once you've followed the above tips of blanching and open freezing your carrots you can freeze them for up to 3 months and use straight from frozen for the best texture.
How to use frozen carrots
To prevent them going mushy, carrots are best used from frozen, rather than defrosting them first. Chuck them into stews, casseroles, curries and soups straight from the freezer.
If you want to eat them by themselves, boil, steam, pan-fry or roast them, until they're cooked through. Because they aren't great when defrosted, we don't recommend using them 'raw' in salads.
We have plenty of freezing advice, from rhubarb to milk and stock to meat. If you are looking for recipes to batch cook and freeze, then look no further than our collection of freezer meals for some delicious inspiration.
