Keeping Green Vegetables Fresh

French Beans and Air-drying chives

Here are some useful tips to keep greens fresh in the fridge for a few days and sometimes even up to a week. We sometimes feel that we should buy just a little more than necessary so we don't have to do our shopping everyday but then find that they are wilted and yellow by the time we really need them. You can actually do several things when you get back from the market/supermarket :

Firstly make sure that all the veggies are dry and not too much moisture is trapped in the plastic bags.

• For spring onions cut the roots off and clean them, then cut the length into two and leave them in a mug so that the water drains dry. Leave for a about an hour on the kitchen table and then put them into plastic container. When you need them, you can then cut them up the way the recipe calls for. Will keep for nearly a week in the fridge

• The same can be done for the celery and keeps for about the same time.

• Chilly padi or bird's eye chillies keeps really well in a bottle in the fridge

• For cabbage always tear off outer leaves to use first coz once you cut up the whole cabbage, it starts to get yellow and brown and there will be wastage as you will have to cut off the edges.

• For Brocolli and cauliflower, it is best to keep them dry and not wash them. Cut them up
  into florets and keep them in plastic container with cover and keep in the fridge.

• Butterhead which is a hydroponically grown vegetable, keeps really well in the fridge. Just use the outer leaves and keep the rest back in the bag that it's packed in and keeps fresh for up to a week at least. Really good eaten raw in salads or blanched and drizzled with a little garlic oil and soya sauce.
  

• String Beans or French Beans is easy to keep fresh too. Just cut the tip and string it, wash and keep whole in plastic container with lid till ready to use then can cut to length required