Preserving onions

[wally]

We discovered last year that frozen onions were our preferred method. What we didn't care for was the onion juice that was created when thawed. We chopped and froze fresh in a zip lock. Would freezing prior to bagging help. Not sure I want that odor in the freezer

[solargeek]

I roast or caramelize mine and freeze. Some chopped for soups, some larger pieces to add to meals. Love them. Just EVOO and onions each way.

[Tim Horton]

So you are saying you roast whole or chopped onions, bag, freeze ?? Need more details as it sounds interesting.

Sweetie cans course chopped onion. With just water, I suspect. Work well in a lot of dishes. We can keep them in the cold room in mesh bags that works well for a reasonable time. If not supervised, I tend to use too many in most anything..

[solargeek]

Yes that is exactly what I do. I cut in the shape I want for a desired future meals, such as chili - chopped; spaghetti sauce- chopped; along side delicious steaks - quartered. I leave at least 10 hole just cutting off the ends and peeling of course for all of them.

You can do them in your crockpot which is the preferred method for really deeply flavored onions, or when I'm in a hurry are use the Insta pot. You have to drain off more fluid from the Insta pot but I save it for soup. Google "caramelize onions" and you'll have the precise time and temp. I do 5-8 pounds at a crack. Cooks down to about 16 1"x1"cubes of onions that I freeze.

[feather]

We ran short of onions this spring. Last year we'd harvested about 270-300, nice baseball sized. I chopped the small ones and froze in zip locks because I just like having the base ball sized ones available fresh. I keep them in open paper grocery bags in the basement pantry which is year round 55 deg F. (and if the cheese cave refrigerator ever gets empty, then they'll go in there because we can make it 45 deg F)

We put in more onions this year hoping for enough to get through the year. We won't know the total number until the end of the week. The landscape fabric has holes for the plant (all kinds), and after all is planted, where ever there are extra holes (because a plant fails or we counted out planting wrong), we fill with an onion. I'm guessing it will be between 400-600, just depends on our poor planning.

To get through June, July, August (when are they harvested again?), I'm going to use dehydrated flakes. Not my favorite for cooking but it will work. I have a half dozen jars of whole canned onions if worse comes to worse. I use onions almost every day, and sometimes many in a day for cooking.

wally, I pack the fresh chopped onion in gallon zip lock bags, flattened, then stacked horizontally each on top of the previous one. Chop, bag, flatten, freeze. When I need onion, I bash the bag against the counter edge to loosen them up, and pour out what I need in frozen condition. They never thaw on the counter or in the bag, so no onion water, they go right into my cooking.

[Skandi]

I cooked mine down before freezing, so chop the onions then cook very slowly for nearly an hour until they are light brown and very soft. then bag and freeze. no liquid comes out when defrosted that way. I also finely slice some and deep fry, dry in the oven and put in airtight jars. and don't forget pickling!
I was most upset last week when I had to buy a bag of onions! the new ones are nearly usable now as fresh green onions so that will be only one bag of onions bought all year, not to bad.

[feather]

Jun 4, 2020 17:45:52 GMT Skandi said:

I was most upset last week when I had to buy a bag of onions! the new ones are nearly usable now as fresh green onions so that will be only one bag of onions bought all year, not to bad.

Not bad at all! I wish!