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Vegetables have a relatively short life. There are some items I gave up buying because some vegetables go bad so fast.
With the Covid-19 outbreak, lockdown restrictions have made it difficult to just run to the store, or be wasteful with produce. Thus, I have been trying to figure out ways to keep my vegetables from going to waste.
Celery Needs to Be Crisp
Celery is a basic staple in my fridge. Unfortunately, it doesn’t last long and gets soft and limp pretty quickly. This totally defeats its purpose of adding crunch to a variety of dishes, and of course a nice crunchy vegetable addition to a Bloody Mary!
How do you keep it fresh? I will tell you! Chop off the end of the celery, trim off all the “leafy” parts, and thoroughly rinse the stems to get all of the dirt off. Then, dry off the stalks using a paper towel or dish towel.
Place the dry celery stalks onto a large piece of foil and tightly wrap it up! Yep, this is the trick! The celery will stay nice and crisp for more than a week, sometimes two! How easy is that?
It’s always nice to have fresh and crisp celery for salads.
Spinach is so Versatile!
Spinach is an expensive leafy vegetable when buying it by the bag. It’s usually about $2-3 for a 12-ounce bag or smaller. And, let’s face it, those bags aren’t always the freshest. When I buy spinach, I typically buy the $5 large plastic container. But, gosh, that’s a lot of spinach!
What to do with all that spinach? I keep out about a 12-ounce bag full of fresh spinach and freeze the rest. This isn’t a fancy process. In fact, I use the “snack” sized baggies that come in the bulk baggie set I get at Costco, and really have no other use in our house.
I take a handful of spinach and stuff it into the baggie, let the extra air out and seal it. The bags of spinach go right into the freezer to be used in various meals, breakfasts, pastas, etc., that need to have a boost of healthy goodness!
I typically write the date on the bags with a sharpie, but I find that we go through it pretty quickly. Especially using them when I make Scrambled Eggs!
Onions are a Necessity!
Onions are always on hand at my house. I keep them on the counter in a vented produce bowl. However, when cutting an onion at room temperature, it tends to make your eyes tear up.
Sautéed Onions are great in my Elevated Quesadillas!
My sister can’t even be in the same room, it affects her so badly! This is the onion gas or fumes that irritate the eyes. Recently, I discovered that if I always have an onion in my fridge, I can cut it up without “crying”!
So, I keep an onion on the counter and one in the fridge. As I use the onion, I keep it in a ziplock bag until I have literally used the entire onion! When the bag is empty, I put another onion in the fridge and add onions to my grocery list. So easy!!
Mushrooms – What to Do?
Mushrooms are tricky business. We love to have mushrooms with various meals, in a salad, sautéed, or just as they are! But, they are always so dusty and dirty! Yuck! To solve this problem, I use my salad spinner!
I rinse the mushrooms off using the basket from the salad spinner, then fill it with water and swish them around in it. Pull the basket back out, and empty the water. Put the basket back in and start spinning it!
This gets the excess water off. I spin them a couple of times to make sure I get as much water off as I can. Water is not a mushroom’s friend! And, you can use this same method to clean other vegetables!
Next, I let them air dry by placing them in a slotted tray (like you would use to cool cookies on). Once they are dry, about an hour or so, I take a kitchen towel and gently wipe away any remaining dirt or debris.
Then, I place a folded paper towel in the bottom of a food storage container, toss in the mushrooms and seal it up!
They will last about a week, staying nice and fresh. If it looks like we aren’t going to use them, I slice them up and freeze them in snack bags to use in cooking.
The mushrooms are great for sautéing and adding into various cooked dishes. One dish is my Mushroom Risotto, check it out!
I hope these ideas have helped you to keep your vegetables fresh longer. Let me know if you have any handy tricks for keeping your vegetables fresh.
Check out my other Quick Tips!
Enjoy,
