How Boiling Water Makes Vegetables Taste Better
By Adina Steiman, Epicurious
Water is tasteless. So how come it makes spring produce so much more delicious?
Fact: Raw broccoli and cauliflower really don’t want to be eaten. Sure, you can dip the florets into something creamy, and they’ll serve as an effective delivery system. But that’s about it.
Give them a quick dunk in a pot of boiling salted water, though, and they emerge reborn—actually tasting more like themselves than they did when raw. No more squeaky chalkiness when you bite into them. They even look brighter and more vibrant.
Related: Our 12 Favorite No-Cook Summer Pastas
Okay, you might say. But I don’t want to eat broccoli and cauliflower right now. All I want is the tender green vegetables of late spring: English peas, sugar snap peas, asparagus, fiddleheads, and ramps.
I hear you. But get this: boiling water can work the same magic on spring vegetables, too. Yes, yes, you always hear about sweet sugar snap peas, the grassy crunch of asparagus. Stop by the farmer’s market these days, and the produce looks fresh and tender enough to eat without bothering to turn on the stove. But applying a bit of heat actually makes those vegetables sweeter, converting some of their starch into even more sugar.
Now, I’m not talking about boiling those innocent sugar snaps into an army-green, baby-food-textured pablum. I’m talking about blanching—a fancy-sounding word that just means briefly cooking in boiling water. Here’s how to do it right:
PREP A COLANDER
Before you even start cooking your veg, place a colander in the sink. That way, you won’t be fumbling for one as your vegetables sit in the pot. Some folks like to “shock” their vegetables in ice water after draining them to stop the cooking, but if you don’t want to bother, rinsing them with ice-cold water until they feel cool to the touch works, too.
FETCH A BIG POT. A REALLY BIG ONE.
Now fill that pot with water. Sure, a large amount of water means it’ll take awhile to come to a boil. But the bigger the pot, the more stable the water temperature will be when you throw the vegetables in.
SEASON YOUR WATER LIKE YOU’RE COOKING PASTA
Blanching your vegetables makes them sweeter and more tender. But if you drop a small handful of kosher salt into the water, you’ll also be gently seasoning the vegetables at the same time. Just like pasta, cooking vegetables in salted water helps the seasoning permeate the vegetable. Bonus: the salt helps the color stay Day-Glo, too.
BRING THE WATER TO A BOIL
Make sure it’s really boiling—a rolling boil, if you will—then add your vegetables all at once.
Related: The 57 Best Cooking Tips of All Time
TASTE AND TEST
Depending on the size and freshness of the vegetables (and of course your own tastebuds), you might find anywhere from 30 seconds to a couple of minutes to be the right amount of cooking time. The best way to tell is (you guessed it) by tasting, so use a slotted spoon to fish out a couple pieces, give them a quick rinse with cold water, and pop them in your mouth to see if they need more time. (Pro tip: If they’re brightly colored and crisp, with just a hint of tenderness, they don’t.)
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PHOTO BY CHRISTOPHER TESTANI
