Blanching helps keep vegetables crisp and tender. By boiling vegetables briefly, chilling them in ice water, then reheating them slowly, blanching preserves texture, colour and flavour. It’s also a good idea to blanch fresh vegetables before freezing them.
Bring a large saucepan of water to a rapid boil over a high heat and add salt to taste. While the water heats, fill a medium-sized bowl about three-quarters full with ice, then add enough cold water to come just to the top of the ice.
When the water is boiling and the ice bowl is ready, trim the vegetables to the size you need. Add the vegetables to the boiling water in batches small enough to ensure that the water doesn’t stop boiling.
Boil the vegetables only until they’re barely cooked through but still tender – in general, no more than 2-3 minutes. To test, remove a piece of the vegetable, dip it into the ice bath to cool, and check.
As soon as the vegetables are done, remove them as fast as you can and submerge them in the ice bath. It’s important to remove the vegetables from the ice bath as soon as they are no longer warm, otherwise they’ll become soggy.
To serve the vegetables, make sure you barely heat them up so you don’t cook them again.