threw out all my frozen green beans

[kally]

last year I made about 20 = 2 cup portions of green beans, blanched them and froze them. They are awful. This is my second flop with beans and I don't feel like trying again.

Are green beans always awful like this?

[Rosemary]

In what way were they awful? We eat frozen green beans frequently in the winter and they are always excellent.

[Zigzagman]

I think the key to good frozen green beans is blanching them just the right time. If you blanch them too long they come out mushy. If you don't blanch them long enough they become leathery. Blanch until just tender. Also I have found that another factor is how long to cook them after thawing. It also depends on the green bean variety. Some beans need to be cooked longer than others.

We also freeze all of our green beans, its not an exact science because of the different kinds of beans. If you get it right I think it is much better than canned because you are cooking the crap out of them just in the canning process. If they are no good then don't blame you for throwing out.

Just my own experience - different strokes for different folks.

Peace

[loosechickens]

the other thing that is important about freezing green beans is not just that they need to be blanched exactly the right amount of time, but that they need to be plunged into very cold ice water immediately afterward to shock them quickly and stop the cooking, AND they need to be picked at just the right stage, and not too big, old or tough. Nice, young, crisp ones are best.

also, they don't "age" as well in the freezer as many other veggies, so keeping them from one season to the next is just asking for trouble. Twenty packages of frozen beans should really be used up within a few months of the time they were frozen, because after a year, unless they are vacuum packed, etc., means they are going to be a poor shadow of their former selves.....

Since it's so easy to plant just a few bean seeds every couple of weeks from spring to fall, making it where you can pick fresh ones for months, I never froze all that many even when we lived back in PA with a short growing season, and when I did, never tried to keep them past the end of the year in the freezer. And toward the end of that time, I would use them in stuff like sauteeing onions, mushrooms and tomatoes, then tossing in the frozen beans, so they weren't standing on their own, because I knew they would have lost much of their "oomph" in the freezer.

hope this helps.

[herbgeek]

There's always pickled green beans....I don't have much luck with frozen veggies, so I do pickled veggies.

[Glo]

I blanch 3 minutes and plunge into cold water. Never had a problem.

[Aqua Blue]

I struggled with freezing green beans also. Now I cook them to just done and then blanch and freeze. When I use them, I don't cook them, I just reheat. It is probably not the best but, I am happy with the results.