Monday, February 1, 2010

When life hands you too many lemons...



I have lemons coming out of my ears. This happens about this time every year. I can't bake fast enough to use them all, my friends only want so many, and it's against Mother Nature to just throw them away.


So, one way I have found to get more use out of them is to juice them and freeze the juice. I pour the squeezed juice to ice cube trays and freeze it. The next day I pop the frozen lemon cubes out of the trays and put them in a Ziploc freezer bag for easier storage and to prevent them from picking up freezer odors and frost. Now I have easy access to pre-measured cubes of semi-fresh-squeezed lemon juice to use throughout the year.

If I want to add more lemony flavor, I sometimes will grate some lemon zest in the lemon juice before freezing it. Each frozen lemon cube is equal to about two tablespoons. Don't forget to put a date on the freezer bag so you know how old the juice is.


While I'm on the lemon kick, let me tell you about my all-time favorite kitchen gadget. It's called a citrus trumpet. All you do is screw the trumpet into the end of a lemon or lime and squeeze out the juice. You can store the trumpet while still attached to the lemon in the refrigerator for a few days if you don't use all the juice.

Another nifty little kitchen gadget is the citrus juicer shown below. This is the tool to use if you aren't juicing enough lemons to get out the electric juicer, but too many lemons for the citrus trumpet. It's designed to prevent the seeds from being expressed with the juice.



Now, what can you do with all of the juiced lemon peels? Throw several of them in the garbage disposal and turn it on. This not only cleans the disposal, it fills the kitchen with the fragrance of lemony goodness.

11 comments:

  1. Do you have a good recipe for lemon meringue pie?

    ReplyDelete
  2. Lemons coming out of your ears can affect your hearing, although maybe that's a good thing these days. I love the lemon tips you offered in your blog. Have you ever had the drink called lemon drops? Another use for lemons.

    ReplyDelete
  3. Wow. . . Did not know all the things you can do with lemons.

    ReplyDelete
  4. Those are some mighty nice photos of the lemons in their various stages of undress. The color just pops off the page.

    ReplyDelete
  5. I like lemon bars, lemonade, Limoncello (a lemon-flavored liquer), Lemon Olive-Oil Rosemary Cake, lemon-flavotred barbecue sauce for chicken, lemon drops, lemon pops. . . an d now I'm out of lemon ideas.

    ReplyDelete
  6. Anonymous, I do have a good lemon meringue pie recipe. Watch for it on this blog. Thanks for the request.

    ReplyDelete
  7. lemonjade, I have had the drink called lemon drop. Delicious! But not so delicious the next day if you have too many.

    ReplyDelete
  8. I agree with you anonymous. Lemons are very versatile and have such a fresh flavor.

    ReplyDelete
  9. Dont forget to post you lemonbar recipe too. It's to die for!

    ReplyDelete
  10. I love lemon bars. They are good for you. too.

    ReplyDelete
  11. Uh hum kthrock. Apparently you missed the January 17th post on that very thing... lemon bars! It's titled, sweet, tart for the sweet heart. Thank you for commenting sweetheart.

    ReplyDelete