There are both green onions and chives in my backyard garden. For some reason, they both grow like crazy and I always seem to have more than I can use when they are ready.
In the past I have harvested the green onion, cut them up and put them in small plastic bags. I would then put the small plastic bags inside a large ziplock bag. No matter how many bags inside of bags I had, my freezer still smelled like onion.
It was around the time that the green onion was ready that I was making a batch of relish. When I was getting the jars for the relish, I noticed I had a number of larger jars that I hadn’t really used in the last few years. It got me thinking…couldn’t I use the glass jars to put the green onion into. I checked it out online and saw that people were in fact doing just that.
I picked the green onion as usual and cut it up into 1/2 inch pieces. I made a full layer on parchment paper covered cookie sheets and put it in the freezer.
Most articles I read said you only have to leave it in there for a couple hours but I left it in overnight. I folded the parchment paper in half to the middle and made like a funnel so I could easily pour it into a large mason jar. Each cookie sheet of onion bits just filled one 1 Litre jar. I put on a regular mason jar lid and ring then put them in the door of my freezer. One of my friends told me to be careful as cold glass can easily break.
This summer I was able to get one batch of green onion and two batches of chives. About seven jars of onion/chives. I am set for the winter.
Another thing I learned this summer while dealing with the onions/chives was that certain store bought jars also fit the mason lids. I am not sure why but over the years I have ended up with more jar rings than jars. For this reason, I decided to save these store bought jars as they are a perfect size for the onion. The jars that worked were the larger Classico pasta sauce.
The label is VERY sticky and no amount of soaking was removing the gooey glue. I tried a suggestion I found online and it worked. Equal parts baking soda and cooking oil (I used canola oil). I didn’t time it as I had about ten jars to coat but by the time I finished coating the last jar, I was able to rub off the first one with a scouring pad. Once they were all clean on one side, I repeated the process on the other side.
Freezing onion using glass jars is not only great for hiding the smell it is also environmentally friendly.
Great idea Corinne. I like the idea of using glass jars and the nifty trick of removing the stubborn labels.