Freezing fresh orange juice prolongs its shelf life so you can enjoy it for months after you perform the juicing process. Freezing the juice is a little trickier than freezing water, though. The free-floating particles of fruit as well as the sugars naturally found in oranges make it difficult to freeze well. Even when you perform the freezing process properly, the juice will retain a flaky consistency. The result doesn’t have to be pretty, though, as long as you have well-preserved juice.
Run the orange juice through a strainer to remove the pulp. Having pulp free-floating in the orange juice makes it more difficult to freeze. A little pulp is fine, but too much will cause your orange juice to turn into sludge instead of freezing well.
Place the orange juice in a freezer safe container with a lid. Leave 1/3 of the container empty to compensate for the increased volume of the juice as it freezes.
Turn your freezer to 15 degrees Fahrenheit (or lower if necessary). Juice has a lower freezing point than water, so you may have to adjust your freezer temperature to get the desired results.
Place the juice in the freezer for six hours. Check on it to determine if it froze all the way. Leave it in the freezer for longer if it didn’t freeze fully.
Tip
Sugar and other additives to the juice will delay the freezing process. Keep the juice as pure as possible to promote proper freezing.
References
Writer Bio
Shae Hazelton is a professional writer whose articles are published on various websites. Her topics of expertise include art history, auto repair, computer science, journalism, home economics, woodworking, financial management, medical pathology and creative crafts. Hazelton is working on her own novel and comic strip while she works as a part-time writer and full time Medical Coding student.