How to Freeze Green Onions or Scallions
Can you freeze green onions?
So, this is one of those posts that many of you will chuckle at and think, “You didn’t know that?”
I am here to tell you that, no, I did not know that you can freeze and save green onions for later use. So for those of you out there, like me, this post is for you.
This year, my backyard garden has given us a CRAZY amount of green onions. They are bigger than I’ve ever seen in a grocery store and I simply didn’t know what to do with them all. I mean, look at these crazy things!
I was about to throw them in the compost when I ran the question past my dad, the gardener extraordinaire, of what I should do with so many leftover scallions (green onions and scallions are the same thing, FYI). He informed me that you could chop them up and freeze them for later use. Duh.
So that’s what I did today. I yanked out a TON of onions, washed them off, chopped them up, and froze them!
Want to save some leftover onions in the future? Read on, my thrifty friends!
How to Freeze and Store Green Onions
First step is to wash your veggies. Use a combination of white vinegar and water to soak or rinse your produce. One study says use 3 parts water to 1 part vinegar. Another said use 10 parts water to 1 part vinegar. I usually use somewhere between those two recommendations.
Mine were out of the garden so I didn’t have to worry about pesticides but I did have to spray some dirt off and make sure I didn’t freeze any bugs along with my onions.
Next, chop up your onions. I first chopped off the roots, then cut the bulb off, and froze those in a separate bag. After removing any dead growth, I choppy-chopped away!
Lastly, spread out chopped onions on cookie sheet. I laid some parchment paper down (to make for easier removal later) and spread them out as best as I could. I then stuck both sheets of onions in the freezer. I do this so they aren’t all clumped up and frozen together.
After they had been in there for a few hours, I moved them all to a Ziploc bag. (I’ve read that saving them in an empty water bottle is handy too!)
How to Use Green Onions that Have Been Frozen & Thawed
Since freezing onions will cause them to lose their crisp texture, only using them in dishes you will cook. So these would be good for soups, marinades, omelettes, fried rice, etc. Here are some of our delicious recipes that use green onions:
Slow Cooker Honey Bourbon Chicken
Add them to:
More Resources on Freezer Cooking
We have a wealth of information on freezer cooking that you might find helpful. Make sure you start with all of the freezer meals in our recipe index.
Here are a few more ideas:
5 Best Ways to Package and Store Freezer Meals
3 Safe Ways to Thaw Freezer Meals
30+ Kid Friendly Freezer Meals
Very Helpful. I only cook a couple of nights per week and so often I’ve bought a bunch of green onions and they are limp and useless in the vegetable drawer of the fridge by the time I want to use them in cooking.
Next time I’m freezing them.
My garden is packed and I don’t want to have them grow too big to use. Great idea, thanks Dad
You’re quite welcome, Helen. Hope it’s helpful!
Would you please explain why the vinegar is needed? Seems like it would affect the flavor.
Hi, Lisa. Great question. It won’t affect the flavor since it’s pretty diluted and rinsed off. It’s just an extra measure taken to kill germs.
Thank you for posting this information. I have a crisper drawer of scallions I picked and cleaned for farmer’s market. Market now cancelled due to the weather – we may get 2-4 inches of snow later today. Too early
Snow?? Wow! It’s 85 degrees in Missouri today. I’m glad this is helpful.
Hi, my partners family of 10 children, always made Green Onion Pie. It’s basically a 2-crust form of Quiche. First you fill your unbaked bottom crust with washed and cut up 1/2 to 1″ pieces of green onion, which I cut with my kitchen scissors, a bunch at a time. Then pour any quiche recipe onto the onions and put the top crust onto this and score and seal the crust. Bake in a 350 degree oven until the top crust is a beautiful medium brown. This pie is delicious and can have cooked bacon in it as well, but not necessary Hope you enjoy this!! <3
Thank you, Marie!
Should the bulb and green of the onion be frozen in separate baggies?
I guess it depends on how you’re going to use them later. I usually use the green and white parts in most recipes myself.
This is great! I came across your post because I was Google searching if I could freeze green onions. Like you, I have an abundance in my backyard and would like to save it all. Mine have flowered and are about two feet high right now HAHA
What do you use the bulbs for?
If they are in the ground, they will continue to grow or put them in about two inches of water in a little bowl or cup and they will also continue to sprout. I put my bulbs in a 6″ vase. I had about 4″ stems left on them and in about two days they were growing out of the vase.
Thanks for the tip!
rinse the vinegar and water from the scallions right?
Yes! Good catch!
Just what might be an interesting comment from a scientist:
In my history of cell biology I and many other lab workers used this method of freezing biological specimens .. BUT our goal is NOT to kill the cells or tissues we’re freezing!
So, these are the basic concepts:
1) Freeze VERY VERY SLOWLY .. i mean , put in a normal freezer but specimen inside a thick-walled styrofoam container!! This tremendously slows the freezing process! .. Then after several days, transfer to a liquid nitrogen freezer, still in the styrofoam box ..
Now, that 2nd step is just irrelevent here, but the 3rd step MIGHT be relevant! …
3) When needed, THAW VERY QUICKLY!!!
Seems counter-intuitive, , but when done with human ‘HELA’ cells, for example, the cells are still ALIVE!!! and can be further treated/cloned/ etcetc
So, it’s pretty obvious that this sequence of events can not possibly alter the ‘nature ‘ of the specimens (green onions??) enough to kill them!!!
Without going to the trouble of the liquid nitrogen step, it seems to me that mere VERY SLOW freezing might be the key to a result of very fresh scallions!!!
Please, if anyone wishes to do this ‘experiment’, kindly msg me with your results, at:
[email protected] !!!
Maybe a Nobel prize is lurking somewhere!!!?
This is great! I just started working with Asian ingredients and wondered about access to green onions this winter for some of the recipes…..No problem know…Have my first batch in the freezer now! Thanks
Sweet!!!
I am a month away from 70. I’ve done a lot of cooking & canning. Thank you for this step-by-step, easy to understand communication about freezing onions! I always tell my friends when asking directions, a craft or a recipe, ” talk to me like a 4-yr old!” Glad you explained in easy-to-understand steps! THANKS!
I am headed to the garden!!! ?
Ha, ha! I’m the same way! Glad we can help.
Thank you so much!! I’ve grown a pretty nice crop this year and all your information has been so helpful! You’re wonderful for taking the time to do all this!
No problem! Glad we can help!
Thank you I put big onions in my pantry and have taken regular onions dice and put in baggies, but the onions are frozen together when you put under water to unfreeze they are water logged I’ll use the cookie sheet method from now on. I did not know I could use the tops of green onions let the bulb continue to grow. We love the green parts in salads but green onions we wanted away to save as we eat lots of soups and hash brown potato soup is one we eat once a week. You use all of the green onions for it with green part as garnish. So thank you my daughter will be so excited to know how to save and what we don’t eat fast enough will not go back. Thank you again.
So if I don’t freeze them how long in the re fridge can I keep them I been putting them in a bowl of water cool
Thank you for this! I love green onions, and would love to be able to just have them on hand when I need them!
It’s pretty handy! I’ve also seen that people are freezing them in mason jars. Just a thought!
Thank you so much. Now I don’t have to throw any out
You’re welcome!
I freeze regular onions all the time, and are wonderful for quick use in preparing a dish and only need a small amount. I just didn’t know if you could freeze green onions. Never use all of the ones I buy at one time. Thanks.
what about full grown homegrown onions? can they be frozen like green onions or do they have to be cured as if for cold storage?
I’m pretty sure you could just chop them up and freeze them using the same method.
Thank you that is awesome
YIPPY!!Thanks so much for this info because I could have saved MANY a dying grocery store bought green onion bunch in my fridge! Winter will be here soon enough and I will have plenty of green onions now!!
Thank you!! So well explained and so helpful. I look forward to using them for soups and fried rice in the winter.
You’re welcome!
I have a lot of green onions and figured I’d try to google and see if I can freeze them as do not want to waste them as I love onions.
yes, thanks to your father and you writing your blog I will be chopping away.
thanks so much
Great! I hate when good food goes to waste. Glad this could help!
Awesome and very helpful because I have so many green onions in my garden this year . Thank you! !
You can do this with chives, parsley and cilantro too. I put 1/4 cup portions in zip lock bags and then roll them up tight and store them in a tall mason jar in the freezer.
Great idea! I don’t know why I haven’t done this before.
You know you could have just trimmed them instead of yanking them. They would still be alive producing more leaves for you.
Thanks for the info. now I can freeze my scallions.
Thank you.
Saundra
You’re welcome, Saundra. Glad it was helpful!
Thanks a million for this post. I got here through google. I way overshot on green onions for our mac and cheese bar so I am pleased to find out I can reuse them in a quiche or soup. Thanks again!
Thanks! I linked this page on my blog. I didn’t know you could freeze scallions either but I use them all the time.
Great info. Do you know long scallions will keep frozen? 2 months, 6months? Thanks!
I’m pretty sure they should be good up to 10-12 months. Maybe do a little more research but that’s what I read.
I have kept them from one season to the next & they seemed just fine to me.
THANK YOU! I wasn’t sure how to do it. Actually, I’m only saving the green tops, as I have a small kitchen scrap garden, and the green onions are re-growing hog wild. So I’ll harvest the tops from them and let them keep on growing.
Glad this was helpful to you and that you can save your green tops, at least!
Wow, I didn’t know you could leave them in the ground and just use the tops…I love that!
thanks , i’ll try your suggestions..
What amazed me among ‘foodie’ sites on the net was a ‘green onion’ used by a guy famous for his sushi skills … The onion bulb wal like 4+ INCHES in diameter!! .. Maybe that’s ‘usual’ in ‘sushi country’ but ive never seen such a specimen ..
Any idea for a source for such ‘monster green onions’ ???
[email protected]
Thanks, this was just the information I needed to save my huge patch of green onions!