Freezing Egg Whites

Aw, my first post of the new month! Happy June everyone... there is only a week of school left (I'm a teacher) so I'm pretty excited! I do have to work until the middle of the month just finishing up paperwork (gotta love that!) and writing up my students' learning record reports but then I'm off until August when I got back limited hours (just for staff development, contacting new students, etc). I have tons of plans for summer projects which include lots of new recipes and lots of blogging! Glad I have a laptop so I can blog by the pool ;)

So, I'm planning on making ice cream this weekend - I've had this KitchenAid ice cream maker attachment for a couple months and I have yet to use it. I was looking through the recipes and decided to be boring and start with French vanilla (so unlike me to be boring with food, but I know my husband will eat it... lol) The recipe calls for, yikes, 8 egg yolks. I have this great lemon-blueberry meringue pie recipe that I'd also like to try but not for a couple weeks. So, I was wondering if I could freeze the egg whites from these eight eggs and use part of that for the meringue. Turns out yes you can freeze the egg whites (yippee!). Here's the procedure which I found by doing an Ask.com search.

**If you need individual whites (maybe only 1 or 2):
You can freeze them in an ice-cube tray (genius!) so they are frozen individually and don't get all stuck together. They usually freeze overnight. After they are frozen, pop them out of the ice-cube tray and into a freezer-weight zipper bag. Label them with the date and how many whites are in each bag. Keep them in the freezer until ready to use.

**If you need multiple whites (like 6 for a recipe):
Just freeze the necessary number of whites in a container (freezer safe), then pop them out of the container when they are frozen (again, overnight should do it). You could even just freeze as many as you need in the ice-cube tray. You can then either wrap the block in plastic wrap then foil and store them in a freezer-safe container (Rubbermaid or a large zipper baggie). Write the date on the container as well as the number of whites.

The tip I found said you can save them in the freezer for up to 6 months. However; be sure to store long-term frozen goods in the coldest part of the freezer (the back and towards the bottom). I'm not sure I'd ever try to keep them for 6 months, but if you're going to be using them in a couple weeks or a month, I think this is a great option. Much better than wasting food.

To defrost the eggs, just remove from the freezer and place in the refrigerator overnight, just like you would with meats.