We grew a bountiful carrot harvest over the fall and winter and I harvest over 4 pounds this weekend. We’ve enjoyed a bunch of fresh carrots of the last couple of months, but now it’s time to preserve the harvest. I’ll show you what I did to freeze my carrots.
Step One – Thoroughly wash the dirt off your carrots. First I spray freshly harvested carrots with the garden hose to remove the majority of the dirt. Remove the green carrot tops; these are great to throw into the compost bin if you have one! Next, I fill up my clean kitchen sink with water and soak the carrots to loosen any remaining dirt.
Step Two – To make round carrot slices, cut off and discard the stem end of your carrot. Take a vegetable peeler and peel each carrot to remove the outer skin. Slice each carrot into coin-like rounds.
To prep small whole carrots for freezing, I peel each carrot with my vegetable peeler, but I leave the top of the carrot intact. I like to roast my whole carrots later down the road.
Step Three – Prepare a large pot of boiling water. Use 1 gallon of water per pound of carrots. Add your carrots to the boiling water and return the pot to a rolling boil. You will boil the carrot rounds for 2 minutes. If you’re using small whole carrots boil those for 5 minutes. In the meantime, prepare a water bath using cold water and ice cubes to blanch your carrots after the boiling process. You should have enough cold water to completely cover your carrots.
Step Four – Remove your carrots from the boiling water and drain. Quickly, plunge the carrots into your prepared ice bath. The carrots should remain in the ice bath until completely cool to stop the cooking process. A good rule of thumb is to leave you carrots in the ice bath for the same length of time you boiled them for.
Step Five – Drain your carrots from the ice bath water and spread them out to dry on fresh clean towels to remove all of the water.
Step Six – Pack your carrots into freezer bags, removing all of the air. These carrots should keep in your freezer for up to one year.
We love having preserved garden goodness in our freezer to add to soups, roasts and stews throughout the year. Some bags I even thaw and cook in a brown sugar butter sauce for a super sweet side dish.
