Blanching

Sometimes recipes mention the term ‘blanching’. This is a technique which is often used to prepare ingredients. The ingredient is cooked very briefly in boiling water. It is then plunged into iced water or refreshed under cold running water. This halts the cooking process.

The blanching technique can be used for various reasons:

-         One very important reason is to inactivate enzymes on the surface of the food.  Some enzymes, such as those in pineapple, give a prickling sensation in the mouth and prevent gelatine in a dessert from setting.

Other enzymes still affect the product after freezing. After blanching, frozen fruit and vegetables stay good for much longer. Particularly when you vacuum pack the product and it is airtight. This prevents ice crystals from forming or any changes occurring to the structure and flavour of the product.

• Retaining the fresh colour of vegetables.
• Briefly cooking a vegetable so that it stays crunchy and retains its firmness and vitamins.
• Sometimes it is desirable to alter the firmness of certain vegetables. Blanching cabbage leaves makes it easier to stuff them and roll them up, for example.
• Blanching can also make a strong flavour more subtle. Take strong flavoured root vegetables like swede.
• You can also disinfect and clean baby bottles or jam jars by blanching. However, you can also do this really easily in the steam oven. It even has an automatic programme, so that you don’t need to think about the settings.

 Blanching, vacuuming and freezing fruit and vegetables in a few easy steps:

-         Bring a pan of salted water to the boil. When you blanche fruit, don’t use any salt.

-         Add the washed fruit or vegetables. Make sure that you don’t add too many at once. The water must stay on the boil.

-         Use a slotted spoon to remove the ingredient from the boiling water and cool immediately in ice-water. You can also drain it immediately in a colander and put under cold running water.

-         Let the ingredient drain well.

Vacuum packing the product before freezing helps it keep its flavour even longer. Make sure that you use the right vacuum level though! Level 1 is for the most delicate products. Level 3 is for firmer ingredients.