Ascorbic Acid and green vegetables
Hey everyone, I often see people use ascorbic acid when making green purees/pesto/green oil in an effort to conserve the green colour. However it was my understanding that acidity reacts with chlorophyll and will brown it. Is ascorbic acid so different from citric/acetic acid that it will somehow protect the colour? Or have people just assumed that since it works with fruit oxidation it will also work for chlorophyll oxidation?
Posted Aug 23, 2021, 11:14 PM UTC
14
Citric acid has one more oxygen atom than ascorbic acid. The best way to preserve basil color for pesto is to blanch it for like 5 seconds and shock in ice water.
Blanch and shock, absolutely!
Yeah that's how I've always done it. Just wondering if there was something I didn't know
You can also maintain the color a little if you cover the top of the pesto with oil to seal out the oxygen that is causing the color change.