Yay! The girls got to see the sunflowers tonight. Teagan jumped up and down seeing so many flowers in bloom. She was amazed at how tall they had gotten, in, what was to her, a short time. Ashlin kept pointing at the flowers and trying to pull on the petals. Yay! So much fun!
Petting Sunflowers
Bowl of Basil
Yesterday I harvested basil. It was well past time, my little container garden has been growing, even with all the neglect they’ve received these past few weeks. I wasn’t sure how to preserve so much basil – I had a huge colander harvested and cut – other than in pesto. I really didn’t want to make that much pesto, even if it was the easiest way.
Hello Google. I found this site that showed two different ways to freeze basil. I had so many leaves that I figured I’d try both methods. Couldn’t hurt.
The first is by chopping up the basil and putting it into ice cube trays and then freezing with water. It was suggested to put enough water to cover most of the basil. Though the basil would float, the water would “trap” the bits, and then once that was frozen, you add more on top, to seal all the freshness in.
Thanks to all the baby food making, I had a few spare ice cube trays I could do this with.
Chopped basil in tray
Frozen basil cubes
I had enough leaves to do two ice cube trays of chopped basil.
Then I tried the second method, which is freezing whole leaves in a single layer on a cookie sheet. My edged cookie sheets are a bit worse the wear, so I lined it with wax paper before putting the basil leaves down. They froze quickly, in maybe 20 minutes, and were easy enough to pluck from the sheet and put in a bag.
Cookie tray with basil leaves
Frozen basil leaves
I now have two bags of basil in the freezer. I’m not sure which method is the best, I’ll be trying both versions in a few weeks, once my plants stop producing. It looks like each will have it’s pluses, the whole leaves can be rolled, when defrosted, into chiffonade, the chopped, added to soups and sauces, even in the cube form, there’s so little water to dilute the food, and that will have some basil essence thanks to the cut edges.
I love fresh basil, and hope that these two methods will keep me in fresh herbs all winter!
I wonder if either method would work for mint?
Videos :) Me! on Ravelry
Whatever! 