Originally Posted by SilverSabre25:
Bananas aren't usually the best for freezing unless you mash them first and use them for banana bread or something.
Blueberries-can freeze as is and then toss into pancakes, muffins, smoothies, whatever. Frozen blueberries is one of my DD's favorite snacks. Strawberries can be cut up, mashed first into sauce, or made into freezer jam (which after tasting homemade freezer jam you'll never want to go back to store-bought stuff!!!). Again, smoothies, yogurt parfaits, pancakes, muffins, sauce for pancakes/waffles/french toast, whatever you want to use them for. Cherries need to be pitted first, then can be frozen as is or chopped up first or made into jam or whatever.
Peaches need a bit of prep--they need to be blanched in boiling water and have the skin removed, then sliced and frozen. Apples need to be cooked down into applesauce or cooked apple chunks. Tomatoes need to be cooked as well, I think (I haven't done tomatoes), but don't have to be actually canned if you're going to freeze them.
Other veggies can be frozen too--zuchinni is best shredded first, then frozen in useful portions (use a muffin tin and make sure you know how much you put in each, then when they're frozen pop them out of the tin and put them in a freezer bag). Peppers--cut 'em into strips and freeze them on a cookie sheet then put into a freezer safe container. Squashes--cook and freeze in chunks or mash and freeze in muffin tins.
That's all I can think of off the top of my head. You can freeze just about any fruit/veggie, though. Fresh herbs, too. Anything you're curious about, just Google "Freezing [veggie/fruit]" and you should get results telling you how. A lot of it does take some prep before you can freeze, but it's WAY worth it in the cost savings the rest of the year. Plus, when you can buy the veggies at the peak of their freshness (and support a local farm/orchard while you're at it!) and freeze them, then they taste WAY better and you save TONS of money.
There's nothing better than "fresh" (frozen) corn on the cob in the middle of winter!!! YUM! And I agree about the jams. I've made freezer jam before and absolutely loved it! I was going to make it last year, but couldn't find a recipe for one that didn't use so much sugar (apparently the sugar helps 'set' it?).