Blanching, step by step
Used for colour, for texture, and for preparing to freeze.
- Boil heavily salted waterMore water than you think — the temperature must not drop.
- Add the food brieflySeconds to a few minutes, depending on the item.
- Straight into ice waterThis stops the cooking dead. It is the point of the method.
- Drain and dryEspecially before freezing.
Times
- Green beans: 2–3 min
- Broccoli: 2 min
- Spinach: 30 seconds
- Tomatoes to peel: 20 seconds
- Almonds to skin: 60 seconds
Blanching before freezing deactivates the enzymes that would otherwise degrade colour and flavour in the freezer.
Questions about the Blanching poster
- What’s on the Blanching poster?
- 4 numbered steps, with a full worked run-through. Used for colour, for texture, and for preparing to freeze. Boil heavily salted water — More water than you think — the temperature must not drop.; Add the food briefly — Seconds to a few minutes, depending on the item.; Straight into ice water — This stops the cooking dead. It is the point of the method.; Drain and dry — Especially before freezing.. Blanching before freezing deactivates the enzymes that would otherwise degrade colour and flavour in the freezer.
- Who is the Blanching poster for?
- Blanching belongs to the Kitchen section rather than to a school year, because food is not something one grade owns. Anyone learning technique can pin it up — a beginner, a student mid-course, or someone revising years later.
- When should you use the Blanching poster?
- The ice bath is not optional. Without it the food keeps cooking and the colour goes. A wall chart earns its place by being glanceable from where the work is happening, so Blanching belongs on the wall where that food work actually happens, within glancing distance, rather than filed away.
- What other posters go with Blanching?
- Batch Cooking, Braising and Caramelisation sit alongside Blanching in the Kitchen section. Printed together they make a wall rather than a single sheet, which is how a reference set actually gets used.Batch CookingBraisingCaramelisation
- Is the Blanching poster free to download and print?
- Yes. Blanching downloads as a free PDF with no account, no email and no watermark, like everything else in the Kitchen section. Print as many copies as you like for a home, a classroom, a library or a tutoring group; reselling the file is the only thing the licence rules out.Read the licence
- What size does the Blanching poster print at?
- Blanching is a vector PDF laid out for US Letter, and prints on A4 with Fit to page — the same file, no separate download. Because every mark on it is drawn rather than photographed, it stays sharp enlarged to A3, A2 or A1 at a copy shop. Colour carries emphasis only, so a greyscale print of Blanching loses nothing.Printing guide
Related posters
Charts that sit alongside Blanching on the same wall.
Browse every Kitchen poster, or start from the full catalogue.