How do you blanch vegetables?

Do you want to keep vegetables longer? Then blanch them and store them in the freezer. Handy and affordable, because that way you can buy larger.

Why blanch vegetables?

If you want to store vegetables in the freezer, you must blanch the vegetables first. This makes the enzymes inactive and that ensures that you can store the vegetables in the freezer.

The benefits of blanching vegetables

By blanching vegetables before you freeze them, you optimally preserve the flavour, color and structure of vegetables. The moment you take them out of the freezer for use, the vegetables still have the same quality.

What do you need

• A pan.
• A bowl of cold water or ice water.
• A container to freeze the vegetables.

Step-by-step plan for blanching vegetables

1. Take a pan with water and bring it to a boil. You can use a lot of water for blanching. A guideline:take four times as much water as the vegetables you are going to blanch.
2. Throw in the vegetables.
3. As soon as the water boils, throw the vegetables into the pan. Keep the water boiling. Do not use a lid on the pan. After a short time of cooking, the vegetables are blanched. Exactly how long that takes differs per vegetable.
4. Scoop the vegetables from the pan into the container with the cold water. This is an important step, it stops the cooking process immediately.
5. Drain the vegetables and freeze them.

Tip for freezing

Immediately divide the vegetables into portions. When frozen, it's difficult to make smaller portions from one large portion. Label the portions with the name of the vegetable and the date you frozen them. More tips for freezing fruit and vegetables.

Read also: More products that you can simply freeze