Process for maintaining freshness of vegetable pieces

A process for preparing packaged diced vegetable pieces, the vegetable pieces comprising potato pieces and other vegetable pieces, the process comprising:

• immersion blanching raw potato pieces having a pH of between about 5 and about 6 in an acidic media so that the pH of the potato pieces after acidification is about 4.0 to about 4.8;
• steam blanching other raw vegetable pieces which have a pH of between about 5 and about 6;
• acidifying the other vegetable pieces after blanching in an acidic media so that the pH of the other vegetable pieces after acidification is 4.0 to 4.8;
• freezing the blanched, acidified vegetable pieces using an IQF process;
• thereafter hermetically sealing the blanched, acidified, frozen vegetable pieces in flexible pouches under vacuum with a nitrogen atmosphere;
• thereafter thawing the blanched, acidified, frozen vegetable pieces in the sealed pouches in the nitrogen atmosphere;
• and
• thereafter subjecting the thawed vegetable pieces in the sealed pouches in the nitrogen atmosphere to high pressure processing;
• wherein the process enables freshness of the potato and vegetable pieces to be maintained in the sealed pouches at refrigerated temperatures for at least 75 days.