Glorious Ginger
I absolutely love ginger root. I cook with it and I make tea, and once I even made my own ginger ale. As much as I love it, I don’t cook with it constantly so some of it usually winds up going bad. Then I found out you could freeze it while browsing a site on growing your own ginger. This was really exciting to me because now I could get a nice piece of organic Hawaiian ginger at local Whole Foods market, and not worry about wasting it. At over $7.00 a pound, it seems really expensive, but I bought a quarter pound for under two dollars and when it was all peeled and minced, I had about 2 cups! There is a definite difference in quality and taste between this, and conventional cheaply priced ginger root.
It takes a little bit of time to cut, peel, chop, and package it but it’s really worth it if you like fresh ginger root. I cut all the knobs apart for easier peeling, then when I finished that, I sliced it into coins and then minced it all til it was pretty small. Then I placed several piles (about 2 teaspoons ea.) a couple of inches apart on a sheet of plastic wrap. I then covered it with another sheet of plastic wrap, and cut in between the piles with scissors so I had several individual packets. I folded over the edges of each one, stacked them all in a plastic container and tossed it in the freezer! It sounds like a lot of work but it only took about 20 minutes or so.
If you’ve never tried fresh ginger you should. I don’t usually use it in baking, but I use it in chicken soup for added medicinal benefits and a flavor boost, as well as Asian cooking, and sauces for seafood. I even added a little to an Indian Rice Pudding recipe that I made. That recipe coming soon.
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