I’ve never been what I would consider wasteful with food but, with some foods being in short supply, and almost all foods having gone up in price, and just not trusting the reliability of our food supply, I’ve found myself being much more conservative with our foods.
Vince has been the one going to the grocery store. He will buy whatever he sees that looks good but he doesn’t always remember to eat what he buys.
The last three times he’s been to the store, he’s bought two large containers of blueberries. They are a bit difficult to freeze dry because each blueberry has to have the skin punctured once or twice. Yes . . I could see me doing that with a watermelon but NOT with blueberries. That would take all day. I have freeze dried blueberries but I just mashed them with a fork and spread it out in the trays.
Earlier this week, I started flash freezing the blueberries. I don’t have much freezer space so I have to do it one tray at a time in the freezer, but flash freezing is simply freezing things spread out so they can be separated vs. having one big tray of blueberries to be broken apart.
If I were to dump non-frozen blueberries into a freezer bag and stick them in the freezer (1) they would probably get freezer burned or full of frost before we eat them all or (2) they would freeze in one big chunk. If I were to try to vacuum seal non-frozen blueberries, they would get mushed and for sure come out as one big chunk.
By freezing them first, and then vacuum sealing them, they will not get mushed in the process of vacuum sealing and they will stay much better in the freezer in the vacuum sealed state vs. just a freezer bag.
I freeze them in fairly small portions – big enough that I could bake blueberry muffins or make blueberry pancakes and still have some left over to eat.
So far, I’ve put up 14 of approximately this size bag and have one more tray in the freezer.
I’m feeling good about putting these in the freezer instead of finding a bunch of moldy blueberries in the fridge in a few weeks!
Donna Williams says
Oh that’s a great idea – reminds me I have some raspberries to take care of.
cassews says
Have you tried making Blueberry powder? I’ve been looking into making fruits into powders just like one would a tomato to make tomato powders.
Judy Laquidara says
I have not tried blueberry powder but I’ve made garlic powder, tomato powder, sweet potato pie filling powder, and pizza sauce powder. For things like the sweet potato pie and pizza sauce, it’s easier to run them through the blender and make a powder, then weight out the amount needed for each recipe and vacuum seal it in those proporations.
Judy Currie says
I know you have said it before, but I forgot. I truly do apologize! What vacuum sealer do you use? Happy Mother’s Day, Judy Thanks from Judy
Judy Laquidara says
I use a Food Saver because (1) they’re about the least expensive (2) they’re easy to find on sale and (3) most of them are compact and easy to store. There are others, that may hold up better/longer but they’re way more expensive and most are not designed to be stored in a kitchen cabinet.