How to Freeze Fresh Pasta (Avoid Freezer Burn)
Fresh pasta is a delight, but it is time-consuming to make. It’s worth shaping larger quantities at once and storing the surplus. But how? Can you freeze fresh pasta?
You can freeze homemade pasta without any problems: First, let it freeze on a tray and then put it in freezer bags. In the freezer, fresh pasta usually keeps for a month without losing quality.
In this article, I show you exactly how I go about freezing fresh pasta and why it’s a great alternative to drying.
Freezing fresh pasta – Step by Step
In this tutorial, I show how I freeze my ribbon pasta. In principle, you can freeze any other type of pasta as long as it is made from a classic pasta dough.
Some specific recipes are less suitable for freezing: There may be some loss of texture with gluten-free or whole-wheat pasta.
So far, I have successfully frozen the following kinds of pasta:
- Italian egg pasta
- Italian pasta made from durum wheat (without egg)
- Spinach noodles (please make sure that the spinach has not been frozen before)
- Beetroot Pasta
- Black pasta with squid-ink
Step 1: Form noodle nests
To freeze ribbon pasta, I wrap it in small nests as I make it. To keep the pasta from sticking together, here’s how I do it:
Before I cut the tagliatelle, I let the pasta sheets dry on both sides for about five minutes. Then, before forming pasta nests, I sprinkle them with a bit of durum wheat flour (semola).
Durum wheat flour is better than soft wheat flour because it prevents sticking together without drying out the dough. The grains will separate from the dough during cooking at the latest.
To form the pasta nests, I grab the ends of the pasta with my fingertips and wrap them around my hand once with a bit of torsion. Then I gently place them back on the work surface and repeat the process until several small nests are formed.
Step 2: Freeze on a tray
Before putting the pasta into the freezer bags, you must freeze it first.
Sprinkle a baking sheet with semola and place the pasta nests side by side on the sheet. It takes about 45 minutes for the pasta to freeze completely. However, I’ve also left them in the freezer for a night without damage.
Step 3: Pack into freezer bags
Once ready, you can take the tray from the freezer and put the pasta into freezer bags. It would be best to do this quickly to prevent the pasta from thawing.
Gently place the pasta nests in the freezer bags and seal them airtight. To avoid freezer burn, allow as much air as possible to escape from the bags. Don’t break the pasta in the process, though! The pasta should survive a month in the freezer without any problems.
If you want to store it even longer, you can put it in an airtight freezer container. But from experience, I can say that they usually get eaten much earlier 😉
Step 4: Label and store in the freezer.
The last thing you should do is label the freezer bags with the appropriate date and contents. I’ve forgotten this step many times, and sometimes it’s beneficial to know precisely when you prepared the food.
How do you defrost fresh frozen pasta?
The best part about freezing fresh pasta is that you don’t have to thaw it! Instead, you can add the pasta to boiling water, and it will only take about 30 seconds to a minute longer to cook.
