If you expect a rich harvest of carrots, you don't have to use them up within a very short time. You can also freeze carrots. However, there are a few things to consider.
Especially when you grow carrots in your own garden, you often have a rich harvest and cannot use the vegetables all at once. You can also freeze your carrots so that the carrots don't get out of your ears at some point and the rest of the family don't just pull a long face because there are always carrots.
Freezing has the advantage that you can keep your carrots for longer. Up to 9 months later you can still enjoy fresh, crunchy carrots from your own garden.
The only important thing to know is that the carrots should be blanched beforehand. Find out more at.
Use only perfect carrots
You can use any carrot for freezing, but they should still be fresh enough. The carrots should not have any bad spots and should still be nice and tender, crisp and young. Medium-sized tubers are best for freezing.
You can also freeze the tiny baby carrots, although freezing may affect their flavor a little. Freshly harvested carrots are best for freezing. If you can't freeze them straight away, it's best to keep the carrots in the fridge for that long.
Preparing the carrots
Carrots can be frozen with or without the skin. Bunched carrots are particularly suitable for freezing with their skins. It is important that you remove dirt thoroughly under running water and preferably with a brush. You can also scrape the carrots slightly.
If it's not baby carrots, the tubers still need to be chopped up. It is best to cut the carrots into slices, but cubes or sticks are also possible. In any case, the end pieces are removed.
Blanch carrots
Now it's time for blanching, because certain enzymes are destroyed in the process, so that the shelf life is extended. Since ice water is needed to chill the carrots, put a few ice cubes in a large bowl and fill them up with very cold water. Fill a large saucepan by twoThirds with water and bring to a boil.
Once it is bubbling, add the carrots for two minutes. If you want to blanch baby carrots, you should increase the cooking time to five minutes. After the time has elapsed, the carrots are drained through a sieve and immediately added to the ice water. Leave the carrots in the bowl of ice water for about two minutes, baby carrots need another five minutes to cool.
Freeze carrots
After blanching, drain the vegetables again and let them dry thoroughly for a few minutes. If you later want to take the carrots out of the container in batches, you should freeze the carrots briefly so that they don't stick together later.
Put the pieces in a single layer on a baking sheet. Make sure they don't touch each other. Place the baking sheet with the carrot pieces in the freezer for one to two hours. If you're going to freeze them in smaller batches anyway, you can skip this step.
To freeze, place the carrots in special freezer bags or a plastic container suitable for freezing. If you prefer to use containers, then you should not fill them to the brim. There should be a little more than a centimeter of space here. After filling, you have to remove as much air as possible from a freezer bag before it is closed tightly. The bag or container is then given the current date so that the shelf life of the vegetables can be estimated.