Blanching Fiddleheads

I posted a couple of weeks ago about searching for Fiddle Head Ferns.

We return to our usual spot each year to collect them, and this year has been no different.

They have arrived earlier due to the warmer spring weather we have been having, I am sure.

On my photo blog, I posted about how to recognize to right kind for eating and how to cook them.

Since they are a very seasonal treat, in the past we have cooked and frozen some to enjoy them a bit later in the year.

Once thawed, they become very mushy - and they all fall completely apart even though they still taste just as good.

This year, we decided to try something different for freezing them.

We blanched them in boiling water for a couple of minutes, then put them in ice water to cool them down before putting them in plastic freezer bags.

Their green color was still just as bright, and they look really good in the freezer.

I will cook them as I do other frozen veggies when I prepare them for a meal a couple of months down the road.

I am quite anxious to see how this method works. From what I have read, it sounds like it might be just the answer to the mushy frozen fiddleheads.