We’ve had a couple light frosts, but our first hard freeze is coming in a few days. I have harvested melons, tomatoes, peppers, squash, and pumpkins – and some herbs- but root crops and cole crops (cabbage, broccoli, cauliflower) will last a bit longer. That being said, they don’t like a hard freeze, so today was the day to get the cabbage into storage.

I store my cabbage in a non-working freezer in my garage. The garage will get to below freezing, but not for another month or so.

I clean and air out the freezer in the spring, so in the fall (when time is really short), it’s ready to go. I put in a layer of newspaper (makes it easier in the spring to pull out the leftover icky straw), then a layer of straw. Next the cabbages go in. I pull mine with the roots intact. I have found they store better that way. I also leave on the outer leaves. If they get nasty, it’s ok – the head will still be good.

They are placed in a single layer with the root end up, then covered with straw.

Keep layering until the freezer is full (or in my case a little more than full – oops). Cover the last layer well with straw.

Now the really important part. LEAVE THE FREEZER STANDING OPEN FOR AT LEAST 3 DAYS. If you don’t, the excess moisture the cabbage puts off will cause all of it to mold and turn completely unusable. If I plan better (and the freezer will actually close), after about 3 days, I close it with a bottle (like a plastic pop or gatorade bottle) in the opening so it is propped open some. This will allow it to stay at the right temperature and allow it to ‘breathe’, so that moisture doesn’t build up. Since I didn’t do that (rolling my eyes at myself!), when the garage starts to get below freezing, I will cover it with a blanket.

I will continue to use the cabbage out of the garden until it is no longer usable, then it will get fed to the chickens (what we don’t use or doesn’t go to the food bank in the meantime). When choosing the cabbage to store, use the largest, most intact heads. They will last the longest. If you don’t have enough perfect heads to fill your freezer, you can use imperfect ones; just put them on the top so they are used first (they don’t store as well). I have kept cabbage like this and used it like fresh up until April.

Shredded cabbage is also a great way to extend meat – think cabbage pockets (bierocks, runza, kraut burgers, whatever they are called in your neck of the woods), but also mixing equal parts (or probably a bit less, like 30 percent) cabbage to shredded beef or pork with barbeque sauce. The cabbage is hard to notice, and the sauce covers the taste.