What to do with all the "storage" onions, the ones that were just too small to bother keeping? Chop and freeze them, of course!
Annie must wonder what all those little things are. They sure don't smell good enough to eat. Not like the carrots and green beans she loves so much.
And then there are the 
Chopped in the food processor, placed on a tray in the freezer until solid, then scooped into bags to be sucked up and sealed......
I ended up with nearly three pounds of chopped onions, ready for cooking. I'll be able to use what I need from the bag, then reseal them after each use.
I did not know you could freeze onions. Could cry thinking of how many I've tossed because they went bad before I could use them.
ReplyDeleteOh, and happy blogiversary! (brain-farting on the spelling)
I've started freezing onions as well. But the sweet onions. I figure my storage onions will keep even if they are small. And I often only want a tablespoon of chopped onion for something so small ones work for that.
ReplyDeleteOh to have all those onions!! What a treat - mine are very small this year.
ReplyDeleteTeresa, yes, they freeze well for cooking, but I'd imagine they're much like peppers and would be a bit limp and/or rubbery if you were trying to add them raw to salads and such. I've wasted a lot too, so I'm really striving to save all I can this year. One has to, what with the price of groceries. I just came back from the store, and Breyer's 1.75 qt. ice cream was priced at $7.89!! I like it, for being all natural, but Blue Bunny was $2.99. The Bunny won out.
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Daphne, I'm going to freeze sweet onions too. These were such tiny things though, I decided it would be easier to clean and chop them all at once, rather than fool around trying to get 4-5 cut up every time I needed onion. We use a lot, so I'm usually going for around a cup, so freezing in large amounts will be good for me.
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Zentmrs, so were these "storage" onions. The largest was probably tennis ball size, while most were golf balls ;-)
Some of my onions that were so small I just froze them whole..I'll use them when I make those dishes where a whole small onion would be nice.. I never tried chopping them up and freezing them! I felt they would stick together too much..it looks like it would work , I'll try it .
ReplyDeleteThose will come in handy this winter. Yummy! And WOW on those 'baseball bats'.
ReplyDeleteGinny, as small as mine were I could have frozen them whole as "boiling" onions. I froze these after chopping them, and they did slightly stick together, but broke apart easily with the edge of the spatula so they could just be "crumbled" into the package.
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Kelly, I have better luck with the baseball bats than the storage onions! Those started out as a bunch of really tiny green onions from the grocery store. They were much smaller than a pencil when I planted them.
Thanks for the tip!
ReplyDeleteI agree that the prices of groceries are crazy. I'm sure glad we are able to get most of out produce from the garden during the summer.
What a great idea. I noticed some of my onions have tops that have knocked over. Unfortunately, most of these are still small. I think I will harvest these and freeze them to add to soups, stews, and other recipes this winter.
ReplyDeleteIf they're storage onions, why would you freeze them? Can't you store them in a cool basement, over the winter. I'm not sure how long "storage onions" would last, just curious. My freezer is usually full of tomato puree, by end of fall:)
ReplyDeleteRachel, thankfully I'm finished with the small onions, but I do want to freeze some of the sweet ones. I'd like to try freezing a few whole (raw), then seeing how they bake.
ReplyDeleteRandom, no basement. Not really wanting to take them to AZ with me for the winter, either. I will pack a large cooler with frozen veggies to take south, though. My freezer is almost full now, and I'm planting more beans. I hate to buy another freezer, 'cause if the AZ house sells I'll bring that freezer back up here.
ReplyDeleteActually, if those onions had been larger, I'd probably have kept them rather than freezing them.
Not bad! Are they not soggy and funky when you take them out?
ReplyDeleteI've never chopped and froze onions. I think that it would be very handy to have chopped onions ready!
ReplyDeleteI always freeze diced onions, diced celery, and diced peppers - the holy trinity of cooking and it is so convenient to just scoop out what you need and then reseal the bag and pop it back into the freezer. Only way to go when you have a surplus of sweet onions that don't store well too.
ReplyDeleteRibbit, I've only used frozen onions for cooking, where they end up being soft anyway. I doubt they'd be great for fresh use, like in potato salad, but maybe they'd work. When I buy bags of frozen stir fry veggies they always have onions in them, so I know they stir fry just fine.
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Robin, they are really handy when one needs chopped onions for meatloaf or goulash and such. Or when one goes to Arizona and has to pay 99-cents a pound for plain old yellow cooking onions. I plan on using these down there this winter, plus some sweet onions I have yet to chop and freeze. Sheesh, that means I have to take the sack sucker sealer south.
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Kitsap, I never thought to freeze celery! Do you know how much celery I throw away in a year? I have a bunch dying in the refrigerator right now....sack sucker sealer to the rescue today!
Don't you just love the sealer. I use it for everything. Also have been using the bags that are like ziplock bags but you can seal them with a little hand held sucker. That is even easier to open and reseal.
ReplyDeleteCelery when I get it home I wrap it in aluminum foil before I put it in the refrig. You would be surprised how long it will keep that way.
Wilderness, yes...LOVE it! I'm going to have to buy another freezer! I tried two of the hand held suckers, but found a lot of the bags didn't stay deflated after being frozen, Then Reynolds quit making them, and I haven't seen the ZipLoc vacuum bags anywhere.
ReplyDeleteI wrap my celery in aluminum foil too, but I still forget about it.
If you check on the HOme shopping Network you can but quart size Debbie Meyer Genius bags with according to Reynolds works just fine. I have the Reynolds handi vac and find that the zip lock and now food saver bags work with it. The food saver bags say refrigerator so if I am storing something long term I put it inside a freezer zip lock. You can fit several bags in one. I haven't seen any gallon size except zip lock in quite some time and I found they didn't stay sealed as well as the quart bags do.
ReplyDeleteWilderness, with the new Rival vacuum sealer, I'm not planning on using the Reynolds or ZipLoc hand vacuums at all. In fact, they are in the bag to go to Goodwill! I do buy the quart and gallon sized ZipLoc freezer bags for short term freezing though, as it's much cheaper than using the vacuum bags. I buy them in bulk at Costco. I use the gallon size a lot in the fridge for storing greens and root veggies too. I just wash and reuse them when they've been used for veggies.
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