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How to Flash Freeze Berries
One of the best ways to preserve the bounty of summer fruit is by flash freezing. This technique freezes the berries individually instead of bricks of rock hard fruit that are hard to identify, much less use, come January.
Having sweet, frozen berries to use throughout the year in smoothies, milkshakes, pies, muffins, or coffee cake will make you feel so smart and prepared. Give your frugal self a pat on the back.
Thankfully, flash freezing fruit is an incredibly simple process.
First of all, wash, sort, and hull (remove the stems) the berries.
Next, dry the berries. You want to get as much water off of the berries as possible so you’re left with individually frozen berries. A salad spinner works beautifully, almost completely drying the clean berries. I’m not sure if it’d work well for softer fruit like raspberries or blackberries, but it’s great for strawberries or blueberries.
Finally, freeze. Tumble the berries onto rimmed baking sheets in a single layer and slide them into the freezer. If your berries are still slightly wet, it helps to use a sheet of parchment paper to prevent sticking to the baking sheet.
Once the berries are firm you can transfer them to storage bags or containers and return them to the freezer to be used as needed.
Freezing berries is just the beginning when it comes to preserving fruit. Check out our huge list of Canning and Preserving Guides!
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If you are in need of some additional baking sheets for freezing berries, these Good Cook Nonstick Baking Sheets are a great bargain and would be an excellent addition to your kitchen. You can honestly never have too many!
Looking for ideas to use up those frozen berries?
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I do not have a large freezer for placing a cookie sheet with berries on it
before place them in a freezer bag
Given this information, do
I allow them to dry a bit before I place them in a freezer bag?
No, you need to freeze them separate or they will stick together in the bag. Use a plate or a smaller dish to flash freeze. It will take longer to get through all of your berries but it will work!
Regarding low sugar pectins; myself, and others, occasionally have a problem with the “low sugar” pectins setting up correctly. Recently I found a brand at the Olympia Food Co-op called Pamona’s Pectin which works excellent. I have made jam the regular way with cups and cups of sugar but always disturbed because it seemed I was canning more sugar than fruit. That is not the case with Pamona’s. So far I have made cherry-rhubarb, blueberry and blubarb (blue berry- rhubarb). The recipes at their website only call for roughly 1-1/2 cups sugar instead of 4 to 7 cups. Also, they give you directions for making jam with substitute sweeteners like honey, agave, stevia and Splenda. My daughter who is a Type 1 diabetic sure loves to be able to eat jam again and I have not had a single problem with jelling. The only downside that I see is that all recipes MUST be water bath canned and once open, only last for 3 weeks (not a problem with my jam eaters).
I was told by my great mom that it is not a good idea to wash blueberries before freezing. She said if you wash them before freezing, they get tough skin and lose color & aroma???
I don’t know about that but, I have 300 bushes and never wash the berries. My sister, who has a 110 acre blueberry never washes her berries that she sells at the Farmer’s Market. That being said, I understand people wanting to rinse the berries when they get home. I have been told not to because it washes the protective naturally occuring substance off the berry so when frozen, you get a “lump” of berries. I don’t think it affects the flavor, aroma or toughness AND consumers use the process in this post, they should freeze just fine.
110 acre blueberry farm…sorry…that would be one BIG berry.
I have been buying and eating Blueberries for 10 years every day in my cereal.
i put the fresh Blueberries in freezer bag. I take out a hand full rinse and eat.
I love them cold in my cereal yummy yummy. also bake with them.
Joy
I use my dehydrator trays to freeze the fruit. I have a bumper crop of cherries this year, so I’ll be freezing, drying and canning them….
eh, that’s not really “flash freezing”…some folks seem to have co-opted the term…can’t flash freeze anything with a regular freezer…
Ha! That’s true. It’s not “flash” as in instant. It is pretty quick, though, and most people recognize it by this term so I guess we’ll stick with it… 🙂
I just want to second the previous comment, actually. I thought, “Oh wow, you can flash freeze at home?!?” [excitedly read article] “…no, no you can’t, that’s just freezing.”
So, I agree with the previous poster from oh so long ago.
Ball or Kerr has a packet of pectin that uses only 1 1/2 cups of sugar with 4 cups of smashed berries. It’s quick and easy and is the most amazing jam ever!
Thanks for the tip! That’s a much better ratio of sugar to berries. I’m definitely going to try that brand out!
Both Ball & Sure Jell have a brand that says no sugar needed/low sugar recipes -the no sugar is in larger letters, so you may miss the low sugar part.
I have never done the no sugar-but I use the low sugar one and like it better than the regular pectin full sugar types, because you taste the fruit more-plus feel better about less sugar.
Williamson Farm Stand on Farmington Rd in Beaverton between Cedarhills and Murry Rd offers day old strawberries for $3 less than freshly picked. Also, they offer a coupon on Facebook for $1 off a flat. They will have day old berries on Tuesday morning.
You shouldn’t need to do more than let blueberries drip dry. I’ve been freezing them this way for years and they stay separate, unlike raspberries or strawberries.
I do too, but it takes a while & the spinner would be quicker.
Thanks for all the advice, everyone. I bought a 32-oz container of blueberries Sun at FM and probably will have to freeze some. I was barely able to finish the 18-oz box I bought a week or so previous. I’d make a pie, but there’s no one around to help me eat it.