Can you freeze boiled eggs? The answer is yes hard boiled eggs freezes for up to a year but you should only freeze the egg yolk. While the yolk maintains an excellent flavor and texture in the freezer, boiled egg whites become rubbery.
All you need to freeze hard boiled eggs is a freezer bag. It’s even better if you have a vacuum sealer since it’ll help you remove air around the yolks.
When you’re ready to use your frozen hard boiled egg yolk, you can eat them straight. However, most people choose to incorporate them into the many recipe options available.
How to Freeze Hard Boiled Eggs
Freezing hard boiled eggs begins with properly cooking them. If you don’t cook the yolk long enough, it’ll be mushy and difficult to store. Alternatively, if you cook the yolk too long, it’ll have an overcooked texture once you pull it out of the fridge.
To prepare hard boiled eggs for freezing, cook them as follows:
- Set the eggs in a pan with at least an inch of water covering the shells.
- Bring the water to a rolling boil.
- Take the pan away from the burner and let the eggs sit in the water for 12 minutes.
- Remove the eggs from the water and let them cool.
While you’re letting the eggs cool, don’t wander too far from your kitchen—the USDA recommends never leaving unpreserved food on the counter for more than two hours. And since your goal is to freeze your hard boiled eggs long-term, the last thing you want is to get them off to a bad start by exposing them to bacteria.
From there, peel the eggs. To make the peeling (and cooling) process more straighforward, we recommend shocking your hard boiled eggs in cold water after they cook. Give them a slight shake, and then peel them underwater.
You then need to separate the egg whites from the yolk. Otherwise, if you try to freeze hard boiled eggs with the egg whites, the whites will simultaneously turn rubbery and watery. Trust us—it’s not a combination you want to eat!
The easiest way to remove the yolk is by using a slotted spoon. If you can’t stomach eating mounds of plain egg whites before they go bad, consider using them to make egg salad, a breakfast casserole, or even chocolate chip cookies.
Now, with your pile of egg yolks in tow, it’s time to pack them into freezer bags. Ideally, you should use a vacuum sealer if you have one. That’ll be most effective at removing air.
If you don’t have a freezer bag, try this handy trick, as long as you won’t be serving the yolks to guests—stick a straw into the freezer bag and suck out as much air as possible.
If you’re wondering why it’s so important to get out all the air, it’s because air will dry out your egg yolks in the freezer. Furthermore, it can spark the growth of freezer burn, a harmless but unwanted effect of improperly storing food in the freezer.
Once you’ve packaged your egg yolks, label the bag with the date, and place it in your freezer.
How Long Do Hard Boiled Eggs Last in the Freezer?
You can store your hard boiled egg yolks in the freezer for up to one year. Be mindful of how you package the yolks; if you want to use them all simultaneously, a single freezer bag is perfect.
Otherwise, it’s best to package them in smaller bags. That way, you don’t have to worry about air getting into the opened bag and reducing the quality of the yolks.
Once you’re ready to use the frozen egg yolks, you’ll need to plan a bit since they require time in the refrigerator to thaw. Leaving them overnight is your best bet. Alternatively, you can run the freezer bag under cold water.
If you choose not to heed our advice and freeze egg whites, it’s best to let them thaw on your counter. Within about 30 minutes, you’ll get to “enjoy” these tough-textured and perhaps slightly slimy egg whites.
How to Tell if Frozen Hard Boiled Eggs Are Bad
Determining if frozen hard boiled eggs are rotten is easy since you’ll follow the same senses you would with non-frozen eggs. Signs that you shouldn’t eat your frozen eggs include:
- An awful or sulfurous smell
- A green or grey-colored yolk
- Change in consistency from regular yolks
Remember that if you freeze egg whites, they’ll take on a rubbery texture without it, signifying that they’re harmful to eat. However, frozen egg yolks do a much better job of keeping their texture when they’re in a safe state to eat.
If you’re confused about how frozen hard boiled eggs can come out of your freezer inedible if you use fresh eggs, a power outage is often the culprit. Alternatively, if you have a freezer that isn’t working correctly, the temperature can rise to a point where bacteria can start to infiltrate your formerly frozen eggs.
Frozen Hard Boiled Eggs Recipe Ideas
Hard boiled egg yolks make excellent garnishes on dishes such as pasta. Not only does it add beautiful color and visual texture, but it also makes the dish richer.
The yolks freeze solid, so before using them as a garnish or in any other recipe idea we share here, make sure to let them first thaw in the refrigerator overnight.
You can also use frozen egg yolks in dishes such as:
- Egg salad
- Casseroles
- Deviled eggs
- Embutido (a Filipino meatloaf)
- Hard boiled egg dressing on roasted or grilled vegetables
And these are just some ideas—there are endless creative recipes you can make with frozen, boiled eggs!
If you freeze egg whites and want to use them in recipes, taste them as-is first. Although we recommend using fresh, never frozen boiled egg whites in recipes, the chef in you might come up with something that can repurpose a frozen egg white’s rubbery texture.
Frequently Asked Questions on Freezing Boiled Eggs
If you still have questions about freezing hard boiled eggs, we’re here to the rescue. Below are answers to some of the most popular questions that people have about freezing eggs.
1. The shell could crack when it expands from freezing, leaving you with a mess once you thaw the eggs.
2. The shell will be more difficult to pick off.
3. Egg whites don’t freeze well, so you should only place the yolk in freezer bags.
If you happen to freeze your eggs whole, you can reheat them. To do so, set the frozen eggs in a pan and pour boiling water over them. Cover the eggs thoroughly, then let them sit in the water until they reheat. If you want to speed up this process, you can repeat it a couple of times.
Yes, frozen boiled eggs have excellent nutrient retention. Sometimes frozen foods have more nutrients than their fresh counterparts because the cold temperature prevents them from losing nutrients that fresh foods naturally lose over time.
You can also expect frozen boiled eggs to have similar carbohydrate, protein, and fat content as fresh eggs.
Only the yolk of boiled eggs freezes well. The yolk does an excellent job of maintaining the texture, taste, and color of fresh, boiled egg yolks. Since egg whites become rubbery in the freezer, you should separate the egg yolks from the whites before freezing them.
If you want to freeze egg whites, it’s best to freeze them fresh. Otherwise, egg yolks freeze well, both fresh and frozen. In all of these cases, you can expect the eggs to have an excellent taste and texture for up to one year in your freezer.
Conclusion
We don’t know about you, but it feels good to know how to answer the question if someone ever asks us, “Can you freeze hard boiled eggs?”
When weighing your options for freezing hard boiled eggs, remember that the yolk is the best part to freeze. By adequately preparing and freezing the yolk, you can expect it to stay good for about one year.
Although it’s possible to freeze egg whites, they become rubbery. So, it’s best to save the room in your freezer for other items. Luckily, there are many uses for frozen boiled egg yolks in recipes.
