Frozen Hearts of Herb Goodness

I have herbs (H-erbs, as Martha would say!) growing in pots by the kitchen all summer.   I saw an idea on Pinterest for preserving herbs suspended in frozen olive oil.  I stopped pinning long enough to actually do it.

This couldn't be simpler - pick herbs, rinse and pat dry with a paper towel.  Rough chop the herbs, and fill ice cube trays with the chopped herbs.  Then drizzle olive oil to fill each compartment. Freeze till firm.

I thrifted this little heart ice cube tray because I thought regular ice cube size might be too big. Since the oil freezes fairly soft, you could even freeze these in a small plastic container, pop out the contents and slice off what you need and send the rest back to the freezer.  Or use regular sized trays and cut frozen cube in half if the whole thing is too much.

 But how sweet are these little hearts of herbs?

These are the sage cubes.  Once the cubes froze solid, I popped them out and put them in freezer bags for storage.

And the parsley ones in small sized regular cubes.

You can do this with left-over herbs from those big bunches you have to buy when you really only need a few sprigs.  I bought some cilantro the other day and had lots left.   Usually left-over herbs turn into The Green Slime of Death in the bottom of the fridge. No more!   I froze these in water instead of oil as a test.

Back in the day, I used to do lots of freezing and canning, but  gave it up when I realized all the other mothers in town spent the summer at the pool!  Now I have some little packages of goodness to add zip to winter cooking and a fleeting feeling that I'm Mother Earth, laying in provisions for the upcoming winter.