Freezer to Table: Garden Green Bean Casserole

It's that time of year when we all start thinking about the traditional holiday dishes that we make every year. I know in our house, green bean casserole is a staple to Thanksgiving dinner. This year though, our green bean casserole is a little different... actually it's a little more special. Why? Because it came from our very own garden. Over the summer, we were over flowing with green beans... way more than anyone could consume before going bad. So we pulled out our vacuum sealer and vacuum sealed tons of green beans into different portion sized bags. You can read about how we did it here. Now, over 5 months later we pulled them out of the freezer to make our very own home grown green bean casserole. This is the vacuum sealed bag after being in the freezer since June 15 -- over 5 months. 

By just looking at the picture, you wouldn't realize that it is frozen solid. Vacuum sealing your vegetables keeps the air and moisture out of the bag and prevents freezer burn. Below is the 'before' the freezer picture from June 15th! Pretty neat!

We always make Campbell's Classic Green Bean casserole. The recipe calls for cooked green beans. When your green beans are vacuum sealed, it makes it super easy to cook them straight out of the freezer.

Cut a small slit into the corner or puncture the bag.

Doing this allows steam to release from the bag when steaming them in the microwave. Once you have cut the slit, place the bag into your microwave for 6-9 minutes. 

Please note: The cooking time in the microwave will vary depending how many green beans and the size of bag. 

We cooked our 4 cups in a quart size bag for 7 minutes and the time was perfect.

Once your green beans are completely cooked, dump them into a baking dish.

Add all of your ingredients:

Stir:

and then bake according to your recipe.

This entire process was so easy. Having your fresh green beans already washed, cut and measured cuts down your prep time so much. Besides the microwave and oven time, this dish probably only took 10 minutes to make. Absolutely love that we can serve green bean casserole from our garden for Thanksgiving.