How to preserve fresh parsley for the winter?

To preserve fresh parsley for the winter, you do not need any special equipment. And the process itself is simple and does not require much time. But in frosty winter, a sprig of fresh parsley will create a summer mood and fill dishes with a unique aroma. By the way, the store-bought alternative, which is sold in the winter, does not have the same taste and smell as the one prepared in the summer.

It can perfectly decorate a dish, but if you chop and season the soup with such herbs, it will clearly lose compared to “homemade” ones. Moreover, even frozen parsley grown in the summer sun contains 2 times more vitamin C than greenhouse winter parsley. So let's learn how to freeze parsley.

Choosing a storage method and preparing greens

To keep parsley fresh for the winter, you need to freeze it. You can also dry it or pickle it, but then there will be no fresh taste. Over the years, housewives have come up with a variety of methods to preserve fresh herbs for the winter, as well as conveniently use them. We can only choose the most acceptable method or offer something of our own. So, you can freeze parsley:

• twigs;
• cubes;
• stripes;
• shredded in bulk.

Whatever method of storing parsley is chosen, it is prepared according to the same scenario:

1. Clean the bushes of greenery: remove rotten leaves, foreign matter, cut off the roots.
2. Wash the parsley.The best way to do this is by soaking in salt water. This method does not injure the leaves (this is important if the greenery is to be frozen in twigs), removes nitrates and kills microorganisms living on it. Pour enough water into the bowl to cover the bunches of greens. Add salt to make the water taste salty and soak the seasoning leaves for 15-20 minutes.
3. Shake off excess moisture from the washed grass and place it on a towel. It should dry, but not have time to wilt. In order for the branches to dry well, they need to be turned over from time to time. Thorough drying is especially important if the parsley is to be frozen for the winter in chopped scattered pieces or sprigs.
4. Now the aromatic leaf seasoning is ready for further manipulations, which depend on the chosen freezing method. They will be discussed in the next part.

Advice: you need to choose one option or another based on the intended purpose of the frozen greens. For example, for use in soup, sauces or other hot dishes, preparing it for the winter in cubes and strips; for sprinkling boiled potatoes, it would be most convenient to use chopped parsley, and for decorating salads and main courses - sprigs.

Step-by-step instructions for freezing

Let's take a closer look at how to store parsley in sprigs, cubes, stripes and in bulk. In order to get neatly frozen sprigs, the prepared parsley should be laid out on a substrate “twig to twig” so that when it is placed in the freezer, the bushes will immediately “take off”. This will allow them to maintain their shape and maximum vitamins. When all the branches on the substrate are well frozen (in 2-3 hours), they can be transferred to cling film and wrapped in portioned bundles.

Advice: everyone knows that to create semi-finished products in production they use the “shock freezing” method. It allows you to freeze any food in a matter of seconds, thereby preserving the maximum of nutrients and maintaining their shape. If your freezer has a "quick freeze" function, it should be used when freezing greens.

There are two ways to make frozen parsley cubes - they differ in the filling. In the first version, the greens are poured with water, in the second - with melted butter. When freezing into cubes, it is not necessary to dry it thoroughly. It is enough to rinse and chop, and then place tightly in molds of such a size that one is enough for no more than a serving. Then pour a little water or butter into each mold. The forms with greens are placed in the freezer to be completely frozen.

The method that allows you to store parsley in strips all winter is similar to that described above - storing in cubes. For it, you just need to wash the prepared leaf seasoning (without drying), chop it and place it in a strip on cling film (15-20 cm), and then wrap it in a sausage (not a roll!) so that there are greens inside and film outside. Thus, it is necessary to wrap all the chopped grass. The result will be several stripes. They should be placed in the freezer and used as needed, cutting off a piece of the required length with a knife.

And, the last way that allows you to store parsley all winter and conveniently use it as a topping for boiled, fried potatoes or meat is to freeze it in chopped pieces. This is the fastest, hassle-free option.To preserve greens in this way, the prepared parsley should be chopped and placed in a container that must be placed in the freezer. In order for frozen greens to separate easily and be pinch-able, they must be thoroughly dried.

Tip: frozen greens can be stored for up to 12 months, cubes with butter for up to 4-6 months.

Other useful tips

Each of the proposed methods for preparing fresh parsley for the winter involves easy portioning. This is because frozen greens cannot be thawed and refrozen, but must be kept in the freezer until ready to use. Moreover, frozen greens are not defrosted before use, but are immediately placed in the dish.

In order to store parsley in the freezer, plastic containers, silicone molds, cling film or special freezing bags are suitable. Glass is not used, as it can crack when exposed to low temperatures. Metal oxidizes when it comes into contact with herbs, so it is also not recommended to use it for storing parsley.

Preserving a piece of summer for the winter is a pleasant and not troublesome task. Let it be parsley or some other greenery; dishes seasoned with it will remind you of summer days and give you the warmth of the sun!