Dictionary Definition

blanch

1 turn pale, as if in fear [syn: pale, blench]

2 cook (vegetables) briefly; "Parboil the beans before freezing them" [syn: parboil]

User Contributed Dictionary

To grow or become white; as, his cheek blanched with fear; the rose blanches in the sun.
To take the color out of, and make white; to bleach; as, to blanch linen; age has blanched his hair.
To avoid, as from fear; to evade; to leave unnoticed.
To cause to turn aside or back; as, to blanch a deer.
To use evasion.
To cook by dipping briefly into boiling water, then directly into cold water.
To whiten, as the surface of meat, by plunging into boiling water and afterwards into cold, so as to harden the surface and retain the juices
To bleach by excluding the light, as the stalks or leaves of plants, by earthing them up or tying them together.
To make white by removing the skin of, as by scalding; as, to blanch almonds.
To give a white luster to (silver, before stamping, in the process of coining.).
To cover (sheet iron) with a coating of tin.
To whiten; to give a favorable appearance to; to whitewash; to palliate.

to grow or become white

to make white

Blanch may refer to

Blanching, a form of cooking
Blanching (coinage), a method used to whiten metal
Blanch (medical), a physiologic phenomenon whereby the skin appears whitish because a transient ischemia is introduced
Blanch, North Carolina, an unincorporated community