Blanching and shocking

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Blanching and shocking is the professional kitchen's most essential prep technique: brief immersion in aggressively boiling, well-salted water followed by immediate transfer to an ice bath. The boiling water deactivates enzymes that cause browning, flavour degradation, and texture loss. The ice bath halts ALL cooking instantly — not gradually, instantly. The result: vegetables that are tender-crisp, with colour so vivid it looks artificial, and flavour that tastes more like the vegetable than the raw version did. This is how restaurants serve five different vegetables on one plate, all perfectly cooked at the same time. They were all blanched and shocked during prep, hours earlier.

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