Can You Freeze Tarragon?

Can’t make béarnaise without tarragon, and can’t get good tarragon flavor out of a jar of dried leaves? The freezer is your answer. Tarragon’s flavor fades fast when the leaves are dried,¹ while a 2022 study found that frozen tarragon held on to its essential oil better than leaves oven-dried at 60°C or freeze-dried, and kept its green color.² It isn’t quite fresh, though: in that study every preservation method, freezing included, changed the taste, and frozen leaves go limp, so stir them into a pan sauce or a soup near the end.

At a glance

Question	Short answer
Can it be frozen?	Yes.
Why freeze rather than dry?	Drying costs tarragon much of its flavor.
Best methods	Tray-freeze leaves, then bag them; or freeze chopped leaves in ice cube trays under water, broth or oil.
Blanch first?	No source recommends it for tarragon; washing and drying is enough.
Freezer temperature	0°F or below.³⁴
How long	For best quality, 3 to 6 months (Ohio State). Other figures below.
Thaw first?	No. Add it frozen to cooked dishes.

What freezing does to tarragon

You can’t make béarnaise sauce without tarragon. Its sweet, anise-like smell is what you’re trying to save, and America’s Test Kitchen counts tarragon among the delicate herbs whose flavors are more volatile.⁵

A 2022 study compared six ways of preserving two French tarragon varieties: freezing, shade drying, oven drying at 40°C and 60°C, freeze drying (lyophilization), and microwave drying.²

Finding	Freezing	Other methods
Essential oil kept	Among the best: freezing and shade drying retained the most, 2.77 to 4.41 mL per 100 g dry weight²	Oven drying at 60°C and freeze drying lost the most, 0.1 to 1.90 mL per 100 g²
Green color	Kept²	Also kept by oven drying at 40°C and freeze drying; degraded by drying at 60°C and at 250 W²
Taste (electronic tongue)	Changed²	Changed by every method²

The study measured oil content and used an electronic tongue, not a panel of tasters, and it describes the leaves right after preservation, not after a stretch in storage. Still, it backs up the case for freezing tarragon: the oil survives freezing better than most kinds of drying.

Texture changes too. Freezing makes the water in the leaves expand, so thawed herbs are limp.⁶

How to freeze tarragon

Prep it. Rinse the tarragon, then pat or spin it dry. Freeze it at peak freshness. You can pick young stem tips and leaves all season, so freezing small batches as you go works nicely.

About blanching. You may read that tarragon should be blanched before freezing to kill bacteria, remove pesticide residues and make it last longer after thawing. We found no source for any of that. Penn State only mentions blanching for larger herbs like basil, for 15 seconds,⁶ and says nothing about tarragon. The USDA freezing fact sheet explains blanching as a way to handle enzyme activity in vegetables, which freezing only slows.⁷ Rinsing and drying the leaves is all the prep Penn State gives for freezing herbs.

Method 1: tray-freeze leaves. Strip the leaves, spread them in a single layer on a tray, freeze until firm, then move them to labeled bags or containers, pressing out as much air as you can. The leaves stay separate, so you can take out a pinch at a time. Air hitting the surface of frozen food is what causes freezer burn.⁷

Method 2: bag whole sprigs. The fastest way: put washed herbs in airtight freezer bags and freeze them. A few small bags are easier to use than one big one.

Method 3: ice cubes. Chop the leaves, pack them into ice cube trays, cover with water, broth or oil, and freeze. Pop the cubes into labeled, dated bags and drop a whole cube into a soup or stew. Herbs frozen in oil keep their color better than herbs frozen plain, but herbs frozen in cubes cook unevenly as the cube melts. Penn State’s ratio for herbs in oil is ⅓ to ½ cup of oil to 2 cups of chopped herbs.⁶

Label and date everything.

How long frozen tarragon keeps

We didn’t find a storage figure measured on frozen tarragon.

Source	What it covers	Figure
Ohio State University Extension³	Frozen herbs, best quality	Use within 3 to 6 months; may be safe after a year or longer
Colorado State University Extension⁴	Frozen vegetables in general, at 0°F or below	High quality for 12 to 18 months; no figure given for herbs
USDA freezing fact sheet⁷	Frozen food in general	Safe almost indefinitely; storage times are for quality only
Penn State Extension⁶	Frozen herbs	No time given; label and date

For comparison, dried tarragon keeps losing oil in the jar. A 2007 study that stored tarragon dried at 45, 60 and 90°C found the oil content dropped during storage, with the biggest loss, about 50% in 30 days, in leaves dried at 90°C.⁸

Food safety

Tarragon in oil. Low-acid foods like herbs, stored in oil, sit in an oxygen-free environment. Oregon State explains that these mixtures have to be stored correctly to prevent botulism, caused by Clostridium botulinum, a bacterium found in soil, water and air. Its rule for homemade herbs in oil: refrigerate and use within 4 days, or freeze for the long term.⁹ A 2011 review concluded that freezing is the safest recommendation.¹⁰ Don’t store herbs in oil at room temperature.⁶ That goes for homemade tarragon oil too.

After thawing. At 0°F, bacteria, yeasts and molds are inactivated, but once thawed they can wake back up.⁷ Ohio State says to handle thawed herbs with normal food-safety care. We found no figure for how long thawed tarragon keeps, so use it promptly. If you have to thaw it, the safe ways are in the fridge, in cold water, or in the microwave.

Using frozen tarragon

Add it frozen, in the same amount you’d use fresh.⁶
Cooked dishes. Ohio State lists soups, stews, sauces and other cooked dishes as the best uses for frozen herbs. Tarragon is a delicate herb with more volatile flavor compounds, so stir it in near the end.
Sauces. Frozen tarragon is fine in a cooked pan sauce or the reduction that starts a béarnaise. For a fresh garnish or a salad, buy fresh tarragon.
Not as a garnish. Thawed herbs are limp and generally unappealing on a plate.

See tarragon uses and tarragon substitutes.

Not yet measured

How long frozen tarragon keeps its flavor. The 2022 study gives no storage time.
A tasting panel comparing frozen and fresh tarragon.
How long thawed tarragon keeps in the fridge.
Whether blanching helps or hurts frozen tarragon.

Tarragon: French, University of Illinois Extension. extension.illinois.edu · Reference work ↩
Hazarika, Kovács, Bodor and Gosztola, LWT, 2022. agris.fao.org · Peer-reviewed ↩ ↩² ↩³ ↩⁴ ↩⁵ ↩⁶ ↩⁷ ↩⁸
Preserving Herbs: Freezing and Drying (HYG-5360), Ohio State University Extension. ohioline.osu.edu · Reference work ↩ ↩²
Preserve Smart: Freezing Herbs, Colorado State University Extension. apps.chhs.colostate.edu · Reference work ↩ ↩²
Science: Substituting Dried Herbs for Fresh, America’s Test Kitchen. americastestkitchen.com · Publication ↩
Freezing Herbs, Penn State Extension. extension.psu.edu · Reference work ↩ ↩² ↩³ ↩⁴ ↩⁵ ↩⁶
Focus on Freezing, USDA fact sheet (copy hosted by the North Carolina Department of Agriculture). ncagr.gov · Regulator ↩ ↩² ↩³ ↩⁴
Arabhosseini et al., Journal of Food Engineering, 2007. agrar.uni-hohenheim.de · Peer-reviewed ↩
Herbs and Vegetables in Oil (SP 50-701), Oregon State University Extension Service. extension.oregonstate.edu · Reference work ↩
Nummer et al., Food Protection Trends, 2011. foodprotection.org · Peer-reviewed ↩

Also drawn on

Preserving Herbs and Vegetables (Julie Garden-Robinson, Food Wise, August 2015), NDSU Extension. ag.ndsu.edu
Tarragon (Britannica Editors, updated 8 Oct 2026), Encyclopaedia Britannica. britannica.com
Artemisia dracunculus (PROSEA), C.C. de Guzman & R.A. Reglos, Plant Resources of South-East Asia, via Pl@ntUse. uses.plantnet-project.org

Can You Freeze Tarragon? Why Freezing Beats Drying, and How to Do It