Crystallized Ginger
This is some Mr. Wizard shit right here. It’s also less a recipe than a personal narrative of my experience making crystallized ginger. It’s based on an amalgamation of recipes I found online.
So, I did this with a fairly small amount of ginger, but I don’t see why it wouldn’t work for larger amounts. First, I peeled the ginger with a spoon like Ming Tsai says. Then I sliced it thinly and boiled it for like an hour. It was supposed to get soft and pliable, according to what I read online, but it refused to comply—it got slightly softer (perhaps I did not slice it thinly enough, but who knows?). I thought I had failed at this point, but I forged on.
I drained the ginger and returned it to the pot. At this point, one of the recipes said to weigh the ginger and add an equal amout of sugar. Not being rich, I don’t have a kitchen scale, so I put in a lot of sugar. It’s better, I now know, to put too much rather than too little, so if you’re unsure, add another handful. Then add three tablespoons of water and put over medium heat.
At this point, I let it go for a while (10 minutes?) and nothing was happening. Afraid that it would caramelize, I took one of the recipe’s advice and started stirring. And stirring and stirring. And then, AS IF BY MAGIC, something began to happen. I wasn’t sure what it was at first. I was scared. Then, it hit me: the clear liquid before me was turning back into sugar. Within two seconds of my realization, still stirring, I was confronted with a pot full of white, granular sugar with sugar-coated ginger in it. Success!
Crystallized ginger costs over ten dollars at the grocery store. What I made cost no more than one. (It’s slightly stringy, but chopped up, you won’t notice, and it tastes great.) Make this. You will feel like an accomplished person.
(Plus you’ll also have ginger-flavored sugar.)
7 months ago