blanch

Etymology 1

From Middle English blaunchen, from Old French blanchir, from Old French blanc (“white”), from Early Medieval Latin blancus, from Frankish *blank, from Proto-Germanic *blankaz (“bright, shining, blinding, white”), from Proto-Indo-European *bʰleyǵ- (“to shine”). Cognates Cognate with blench (“to deceive, to trick”) through Proto-Indo-European, whence other etymology of blanch.

verb

1. (intransitive) To grow or become white.
   His cheek blanched with fear.
   The rose blanches in the sun.
2. (transitive) To take the color out of, and make white; to bleach.
   to blanch linen
   Age has blanched his hair.
3. (transitive, cooking) To cook by dipping briefly into boiling water, then directly into cold water.
4. (transitive) To whiten, for example the surface of meat, by plunging into boiling water and afterwards into cold, so as to harden the surface and retain the juices
5. (transitive) To bleach by excluding the light, for example the stalks or leaves of plants, by earthing them up or tying them together
6. (transitive) To make white by removing the skin of, for example by scalding
   to blanch almonds
7. (transitive) To give a white lustre to (silver, before stamping, in the process of coining)
8. (intransitive) To cover (sheet iron) with a coating of tin.
9. (transitive, figurative) To give a favorable appearance to; to whitewash; to whiten;
   c. 1680, John Tillotson, The indispensable necessity of the knowledge of the Holy Scripture Blanch over the blackest and most absurd things.

Etymology 2

Variant of blench, of same Proto-Indo-European origin.

verb

1. To avoid, as from fear; to evade; to leave unnoticed.
   I suppose you will not blanch Paris in your way. 1624-39, Sir Henry Wotton, Reliquiæ Wottonianæ (published 1651), page 343
2. To cause to turn aside or back.
   to blanch a deer
3. To use evasion.