Can You Freeze Cooked Cabbage? Here’s How You Can Do This

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How to thaw cooked cabbage

How to freeze cooked cabbage

Can You Freeze Cooked Cabbage? Here's How You Can Do This

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Cabbage is a great vegetable and it’s so versatile as you can serve it in so many ways. However, you may sometimes have too much of it and if you want to store it, freezing may be the best idea. But, can you freeze cooked cabbage?

Freezing cooked cabbage would be the best solution and considering that you can cook cabbage rolls, there shouldn’t be any issues. However, there certainly are rules to doing this.

Can You Freeze Cooked Cabbage?

One of our readers seems to have an issue with having too much cabbage on their hands and sent us the following message:

This may sound like a weird question, but I need to know! My family makes cabbage rolls each year, which involves boiling large heads of cabbage and separating the leaves to use to put the filling in.

The only problem is that only very large leaves work for that purpose, leaving the smaller leaves left over. So now I have a whole bunch of leftover cooked cabbage that I don’t know what to do with. Can you freeze cooked cabbage?

Sure you can freeze cooked cabbage. It’s actually a great way of preserving it for future use. Cooked cabbage is great in many recipes, from soups and stews to simply sautéed cabbage sautéed in butter.

Its dense texture stays intact during the freezing process, and the flavor is not affected at all. It only takes a bit of preparation to make sure that the cabbage doesn’t get freezer burned.

How to Freeze Cooked Cabbage?

If the cabbage has only been cooked in water, place it on paper towels to let it dry completely before freezing it.

• Place the cabbage in a single layer on a baking sheet in the freezer until the cabbage is hard, about 20 minutes. This will help avoid clumping upon freezing.
• Remove the cabbage from the freezer and place it in a freezer bag.
• Remove the excess air from the bag, then seal it.
• Label and date the bag.
• Use frozen cabbage within 6 months for best results.
• If you plan on using small amounts of cabbage, consider placing the cooked cabbage in small freezer bags that contain a single serving each. That way it’s easy to remove a single serving from the freezer at one time.

Another way to freeze cooked cabbage is to cut it into bite sized pieces, and then season and sauté it before freezing. This makes the cabbage ready to eat upon thawing and reheating, but doesn’t require any other preparation to enjoy the cabbage.

• To freeze cooked and sautéed cabbage, prepare the cabbage and sauté it, and then let it cool.
• Once cooled enough that no steam is coming off the cabbage, place the cooked cabbage in freezer bags.
• Remove the excess air, and then seal the bags.
• Cabbage can be heated directly from frozen and enjoyed as is.

How to Keep Cooked Cabbage Longer?

If you want to make sure that your cooked cabbage lasts for longer, you can use a vacuum sealer. These appliances will suck out the air from the bags and create a perfect seal.

We have a long list of great vacuum sealers you can get, but our favorite is the FoodSaver V4840 2-in-1 Vacuum Sealer Machine. This one works with freezer bags and containers of various sizes so you can save up single servings or whole dishes.

How to Thaw Cooked Cabbage?

When it’s time to eat your cooked cabbage next, you can start ahead of time.

• To thaw, remove the desired amount of cabbage from the freezer and allow it to stay in the refrigerator until completely thawed.
• Then, chop and prepare the cabbage according to the recipe it will be used in.