overwordExplorer
ENGLISH · A WORD WITH POSSIBILITIES

blanch.

To grow or become white.

6 characters1 syllables approx.English language

Meaning & usage

verb/blɑːnt͡ʃ//blænt͡ʃ/
  1. To grow or become white.

    intransitive
    His cheek blanched with fear.
    The rose blanches in the sun.
  2. To take the color out of, and make white; to bleach.

    transitive
    to blanch linen
    Age has blanched his hair.
  3. To cook by dipping briefly into boiling water, then directly into cold water.

    transitive
  4. 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.

    transitive
  5. To bleach by excluding light, for example the stalks or leaves of plants by earthing them up or tying them together.

    transitive
  6. To make white by removing the skin of, for example by scalding.

    transitive
    to blanch almonds
  7. To give a white lustre to (silver, before stamping, in the process of coining)

    transitive
  8. To cover (sheet iron) with a coating of tin.

    intransitive
  9. To give a favorable appearance to; to whitewash; to whiten;

    figuratively · transitive
Where this word comes from

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/blɑːnt͡ʃ//blænt͡ʃ/
  1. To avoid, as from fear; to evade; to leave unnoticed.

  2. To cause to turn aside or back.

  3. To use evasion.

Where this word comes from

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

FROM WORD TO NAME

Try it on your idea.

blanch has 6 characters. Say it out loud, try it alongside a description of your project, and see whether its meaning fits what you want to create.

blanch studioblanch workshello, blanch

These are naming prompts. Meanings and pronunciation can vary; existing brand and domain uses have not been checked.

Explore the name generator

A word with a source.

Definitions, grammatical labels, IPA, etymology and examples: Wiktionary contributors, extracted by Kaikki / Wiktextract. Adapted under CC BY-SA 4.0. Selected fields and authored examples are shown; third-party quotations and audio are omitted. See contributor history.

Last enriched 2026-09-10. Definitions are in English. Romanizations are shown when supplied by the source; syllable estimates are omitted for unsupported scripts.