Keep your leafy greens fresh by freezing them for your smoothies and recipes. Find out how to freeze spinach 3 different ways.

I have recently started to pay more attention to the benefits of organic food as I continue to clean up my diet.  I never used to bother buying organic greens.  

I just used to use normal spinach or kale or store bought frozen spinach.  

I didn’t used to buy much organic produce at all as I reasoned that I would rather use the money to buy more fruit than have to buy less but more expensive organic produce.  

However, I’ve changed my mind recently.  I don’t want to have to eat more pesticides than I need and if that means filling up on more carbs rather than fruit I’ll take that option.

As leafy greens are practically all surface area, pesticides heavily cover them and you will end up eating a large amount of these chemicals on from your greens.  

I can actually feel the difference touching the spinach myself.  

Normal spinach feels very waxy and organic spinach feels a lot fresher.  

There isn’t actually much difference in price where I live but the problem is I can’t get hold of it at my local store.  

So that means I have to buy in bulk to last me 1-2 weeks, which means I have to freeze my greens to make them last.

4 Reasons for Freezing Your Greens For Green Smoothies:

How to freeze spinach (or other leafy greens)

There are 3 ways to freeze your greens.  The only mild organic greens I can get hold of are spinach and kale so I can’t do much rotation of my greens.  I’m hoping to grow more chard in the summer though and I will use romaine lettuce occasionally but I prefer to eat this in my daily salad.  Here are the 3 ways to freeze your greens. You can follow these directions for any leafy greens.  I usually mix my spinach and kale together.

1: Blend raw greens with water and freeze

This is the method I use.  As my greens are pre-blended it means less blending when I come to make my smoothie and they can be easily poured into molds and you can measure exactly how much you are using.  It makes your smoothie lovely and cold too.  I would add the frozen green chunks in at the end of making your smoothie as it will be easier for your blender to blend them. It is pretty simple to make these.

1. Wash your fresh greens.  You can blend as much as will fit in your blender from a couple of handfuls up to a large amount.  I usually add about 3 bags (600g/ 21 oz) about 6 large handfuls in total until my blender is pretty full. 
2. Add 1 Cup of water to your blender
3. Add the first couple of handfuls to your blender and blend for a couple of seconds until the greens have been dispersed into the water.  Continue to add your greens blending briefly until all your greens are added.
4. Blend all the greens for a minute or so until they are smooth.
5. Pour the green water into molds.  You can either use muffin trays, mini muffin trays or ice cube trays.  I think mini muffin trays are the perfect size to add to smoothies if you don’t have a high speed blender as the larger muffin trays may not be able to blend as easily.  I more often use the larger muffin trays now as it makes it quicker to pour, remove them and pop a couple into a big batch of smoothie every day.  I also use silicone trays and molds which makes it very easy to get the frozen greens out of them when they are frozen.
6. If you want to know how many cups you are getting per mold you’ll have to measure how many loosely packed cups you add to your blender then divide that by the number of molds you use.  You will then know how many cups you are putting into your smoothie.
7. Put your muffin/ ice cube trays in your freezer and freeze until solid.
8. Remove the frozen greens from the trays.  If they aren’t coming out easily you may need to wait a few minutes for them to slightly defrost.
9. Add the frozen green chunks back to your freezer in a bag.
10. Pop a couple of frozen green chunks in your blender after you’ve added all your other ingredients to your blender for your smoothie.  You can also use these chunks in soups or stews but not good for any recipes that you need a bit of texture for as they are blended up smoothly.

NOTE: If your blender can’t cope with frozen ingredients, just leave these to thaw before adding them to your blender.  It will make your smoothie much smoother and easier to blend.    The smaller the green smoothie cubes are, the easier they are to blend.

 2: Freeze raw green leaves

This method is easier than the above method but I like blending my greens as it compresses the greens down and I don’t have to take up much space in my freezer.  This method is so quick and easy.

1. Wash your greens
2. Add them to freezer bags, pressing them down and squeezing all the air out of them.
3. Tie the bags up and freeze them .
4. When ready to use you can break chunks of greens from your bag for use in either your smoothies or cooking.

3: Freeze Blanched green leaves

Some people prefer to blanch or lightly steam their greens before consumption.  There is concern that if you eat too much spinach you may consume too many oxylates.  Some people are sensitive to oxylates and if you find you can’t tolerate spinach then I suggest you do some more research into this.  This article is a good starting point.  You may prefer to blanch your greens to reduce the level of oxylates, retain the colour of the spinach brings out the flavour and reduces them down.  This will also reduce the amount of nutrients in the greens which is why I don’t do it.

1. Bring a large pan of water to the boil
2. Wash your greens
3. Add them to the boiling water for a couple of seconds.
4. Remove, add to cold water to stop them cooking, drain and spin or squeeze the water out.
5. Add them to freezer bags, pressing them down and squeezing all the air out of them.
6. Tie the bags up and freeze them .
7. When ready to use you can break chunks of greens from your bag for use in either your smoothies or cooking.

Have you ever tried freezing greens?

I know you may not have time to digest all this right now, so I wanted to give you a handy print out of this blog post so you can stick it on your fridge to help you on your journey to optimal health.

Click here to download your FREE PDF of this blog post now.

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Katherine Kyle @ Green Thickies

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