Frozen pieces of watermelon make an excellent dessert - mint sherbet. It combines watermelon with sugar, lime juice, mint and other optional ingredients.
Also, watermelon is suitable for preparing a variety of fruit desserts, and a milkshake is obtained simply divine, if you add a few cubes of frozen milk to a glass of milk before whipping mashed potatoes.
Is watermelon suitable for freezing
Freezing is an effective method of preserving fresh vegetables, fruits and berries. This method perfectly preserves the original characteristics of the product.
Not everyone knows about the possibility of freezing a watermelon, but the method has many advantages. How good it is to get a couple of slices of watermelon out of the freezer in winter and make lemonade, juice or fruit sorbet.
Scientists have proven that the destruction of vitamins under the influence of low temperatures is nothing more than a myth. It turns out that only a small part of vitamin C is lost, and moreover, losses can be significantly reduced using the shock freezing method. About 85% of nutrients will remain unchanged.
Freezing is the best way of preserving, as it preserves the naturalness of products, color and smell. In contrast to, for example, jams, where, under the influence of sugar, the taste of the original product changes greatly.
Usually ripe and juicy fruits are frozen, washed well. The output is no less high-quality product than fresh. And the fruits and berries in the outlets in winter are unripe, and even processed with chemicals for better maturation. You will get more harm from such products than vitamins.
The only thing worth mentioning is that after freezing, the watermelon will no longer crunch as appetizing as fresh. Freezing disturbs the structure of the product. But this is a minor drawback.
The main thing in this whole process is to choose good sweet berries and freeze them correctly. Then up to 90% of vitamins are preserved in them, and trace elements are not destroyed at all.
How to choose the right fruit to freeze
The main conditions are the large size of the watermelon, ripe sugary pulp and sweet taste. They also pay attention to:
- The peel should be free of cracks and damage.
- The fruit is of the correct shape.
- The color of the fruit is typical, without foreign spots.
- The tail is dry, without signs of rot.
Freezing methods
- Whole. This method is used when there is a large freezer or on an industrial scale. At home, they rarely freeze like this. If you nevertheless decide to freeze whole, wash the fruits well, you can even use soap, dry them and then put them in the freezer.
- In pieces. The fruit is cut into approximately equal slices, the peel is cut off and the seeds are removed. With cookie cutters, you can cut interesting figures from the pulp or simply cut with a knife. With the help of a special ice cream spoon, you can get balls. The resulting splendor is sorted into packaging bags and placed in the freezer.
- With sugar. Similar to the previous method, only pieces of watermelon are placed in containers and sprinkled with sugar. Take 5 parts of watermelon to 1 part of sugar.
In addition to the above methods, you can freeze watermelon in syrup, in the form of puree, juice. These methods are less popular, but there are amateurs for them too.
Storage periods
Blanks without sugar are stored for no more than six months, and with sugar it is permissible up to 12 months at a temperature of no more than 18 degrees. The main thing is not to allow accidental defrosting, this will reduce the quality of the product.
Read also: All do not care! How to deal with blackening and curling of pear leaves?
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