Do you have too much fresh basil in your kitchen? Then preserving basil is the answer to your problem so you can use it all year long. Try it out!
These little tricks are very easy to do…
There are quite a couple of methods for preserving fresh basil all year long.
You can dry the basil leaves in the oven for 2 to 3 hours at low temperature for instance.
Or blanch the basil leaves for just a split second in warm water, pat them dry with kitchen paper and then freeze the leaves separately.
Saving Fresh Basil For Later
My favorite way to preserving basil though is to puree it, make a fresh kind of basil pesto and then freeze it into small portions in an ice cube tray.
It is my favorite and also fail proof method!
And it comes in handy and ready to use in lots of recipes.
I love to add the frozen pesto to soups, risotto, pasta, even vinaigrettes and potato mash.
So here is how simple it is!
Let’s take a look.
Preserving basil: frozen basil pesto cubes
2. fill an ice cube tray with the pesto
3. freeze the pesto for 24 hours
4. remove the pesto cubes from the tray and keep them in a plastic bag or container in your freezer for further use
Preserving basil: frozen basil in olive oil
Here is another way to freeze your fresh basil!
Much quicker and perfect for salads or meat marinades…
1. rinse and slice the fresh basil leaves
2. divide the sliced basil over an ice cube tray
3. fill the tray up with olive oil
4. place the tray in the freezer for 24 hours
5. remove the basil and olive cubes from the tray and keep them in a plastic bag or container in your freezer for further use
More Inspiration
Do you need more inspiration?
Then you should also check out these recipes with basil!
Recipes with basil:
