Many favorite Japanese dishes are not complete without the use of pickled ginger. You can buy it in supermarkets or sushi bars. But why not pickle the ginger yourself at home?
Pickled ginger is a very unusual spice, but loved by many fans of oriental cuisine. Delicate pink plates with a slightly sweet taste are used for making sushi and rolls, for dressing meat dishes and for creating unique exotic sauces. And given the beneficial properties of ginger and its richest chemical composition, it is not surprising that in the Land of the Rising Sun, ginger takes pride of place on any table and at any time of the year.
Pickling ginger preserves the maximum amount of vitamins and nutrients in the final product. Unfortunately, fresh ginger root loses its nutritional value rather quickly, and therefore, treating ginger with marinade will not only extend its shelf life, but also ensure that all its beneficial properties are preserved.
For pickling, you should choose smooth, large roots with dense skin. They need to be rinsed first and then cleaned. The ginger skin is thin and can be easily removed by scraping with a knife. Peeled ginger is cut into thin slices, rubbed with salt and refrigerated for a couple of days.
Now you need to take care of the marinade. All known recipes involve the use of rice vinegar. Of course, if you run around specialized stores, then buying it will not be a big problem. But it is not cheap at all. Therefore, it is quite possible to replace this ingredient with ordinary apple cider vinegar or grape vinegar. This will slightly affect the taste of the original product, but there won't be much difference.
To prepare the marinade for 100 ml of vinegar, take a teaspoon of coarse salt and a tablespoon of sugar. The mixture is brought to a boil with occasional stirring. Meanwhile, the salted ginger slices are tightly packed into a glass jar and poured over with hot, freshly prepared marinade. The whole mass is tamped tightly, the jar is closed with a nylon lid and placed in a dark place for a week. Subsequently, ready-made pickled ginger is stored in the refrigerator for several months.
Separately, I would like to draw your attention to the fact that the color of pickled ginger depends to a large extent on the age of the roots used. After pickling, adult and slightly stale ginger has a yellowish color, but young fresh roots acquire a pinkish tint of pickled plates during storage.
