Are you drowning in your bumper crop of zucchini? Here’s how to freeze zucchini so you can preserve that bountiful harvest to enjoy later.
I’ve been sharing a bunch of different recipes and ideas over the last little while for how to use up all of that zucchini that seems to come out of even the smallest garden at this time of year. If all else fails though, and you’ve tried every recipe in the book for zucchini, given some away to friends, and you still have more to spare, you can always freeze it! Zucchini is great in soups, stews, stir-fry, casseroles, and of course chocolate zucchini cake and even though you’re probably a bit tired of it right now, in the winter you’ll probably be so happy you learned how to freeze zucchini when you have that little taste of summer that you can just pull out of your freezer.
So here’s what you need to know so you can freeze your zucchini and enjoy it year-round!
How to Freeze Zucchini
Prep With a Plan
First, start by preparing it for the purpose that you’ll be using it for later in the fall and winter.
If you have a lot of zucchini, it’s nice to prepare it in a few different ways so you can use it for different things throughout the winter. You’ll probably want a few larger slices for baking into casseroles…
…and some nice chunks for soups, stews, and stirfry.
If you plan on making zucchini muffins, breads, or cakes, you should grate it now and portion it off into 1-2 cup amounts so you can grab exactly what you’ll need for your recipes.
Blanch It
Once you’ve got your zucchini all prepared, it’s a good idea to blanch it in boiling water for about 2-3 minutes. This helps de-activate the enzymes that naturally discolor zucchini over time and turn it mushy. Once the 2-3 minutes are up, plunge your zucchini into a big bowl of ice water to stop the cooking.
Don’t worry about blanching for your grated portions of zucchini, because you kind of want it to turn to mush and break down into your cake anyway.
Freeze It
For the actual freezing part of the process, lay the zucchini out on cookie sheets in your freezer so the pieces don’t all freeze together in a clump. Once everything’s nice and frozen, you can transfer it to plastic containers, ziplock bags, or whatever you’ll be using to store it in the freezer.
And that’s all it takes to get reader to enjoy zucchini all winter long! I love doing this because it’s so quick and easy since zucchini is so easy to cut and it really helps me deal with the giant mountain of zucchini that seems to appear on my counter every few days in a way that’s quick and efficient.
Do you freeze your zucchini at the end of summer? Do you have any other fun ways of saving your zucchini for later?
More Great Kitchen Tricks and Ideas
- How to Peel a Whole Head of Garlic in Less Than a Minute
- 3 Ingredient Banana Bread
- Easy, Restaurant-Style Sauteed Mushrooms at Home
- How to Keep Brown Sugar Soft
- How to Freeze Avocado
- Crock Pot Vanilla Cantaloupe Jam
- How to Keep Avocado From Turning Brown
- How to Make Zucchini Pasta Noodles Without a Fancy Spiralizer
Courtenay Hartford is the author of creeklinehouse.com, a blog based on her adventures renovating a 120-year-old farmhouse in rural Ontario, Canada. On her blog, Courtenay shares interior design tips based on her own farmhouse and her work as founder and stylist of the interior photography firm Art & Spaces. She also writes about her farmhouse garden, plant-based recipes, family travel, and homekeeping best practices. Courtenay is the author of the book The Cleaning Ninja and has been featured in numerous magazines including Country Sampler Farmhouse Style, Better Homes and Gardens, Parents Magazine, Real Simple, and Our Homes.