How To Freeze Spinach Without A Watery, Soggy Mess

Spinach is a powerful ingredient that can make any basic dish seem fancier. It adds texture to sandwiches, earthy flavor to pasta sauce, and boosts the nutrients in breakfast omelets. The biggest gripe one can have with this ingredient is its short shelf life. Even fresh spinach with proper storage hardly lasts more than a week in the fridge, and it can spoil sooner if you're opening and closing the container it came in. This is a real pain if you can't go through it all at once and want to avoid wasting food.

Extend the shelf life of spinach by freezing it — all you need to do is sacrifice a few minutes of your time to make it last an entire year. The key is blanching before freezing. Blanching is a technique where vegetables are steamed or submerged in boiling water and then transferred to an ice-cold water bath. This process "shocks" the food by slowing the enzymes that wilt the leaves and create unpleasant tastes and odors.

To nail the blanch, you'll need to properly wash and drain the fresh spinach. Put on a pot of boiling water with lots of salt, as creating a brine helps lock in the spinach's flavor. Boil the clean leaves for a couple of minutes, then, using a slotted spoon, scoop them into a bowl filled with ice-cold water. They'll be ready to store with plenty of flavor and color.

After blanching the spinach, you'll want to drain all the extra moisture out of the leaves because too much water will have them sticking together in an ugly green blob. It's also annoying trying to get rid of this extra moisture when defrosting the spinach later. Using a cheesecloth or paper towels you can gently wring the water from the spinach and then pat it dry. When the leaves look dry and loose, that's when they can be sealed in an air-tight freezer bag.

If you're not as concerned with maintaining the leafy shape, you can blend the washed spinach with water to make a puree. This is handy for mixing into smoothies and sauces where the spinach takes a more subtle role. Pour the puree into an ice cube tray and freeze for convenient cubes that you can pop out at a moment's notice.

When it's time to put your frozen spinach to work, you can defrost it by letting it thaw in the fridge. For more instant results, placing the frozen spinach under running water or briefly sticking it into hot water can wake it up. Defrosting and draining stop you from having to overcook your spinach to get rid of excess moisture in the skillet — overcooking sauteed spinach can lead to it becoming bitter. All this prep might seem like a hassle, but spinach cooks in an instant. This means that timing is everything.