Homemade Fermented Ginger Paste For Convenience and Long-term Storage
This ginger paste is fermented for long storage and to add probiotics and enhance its health promoting compounds. This is a convenient way to have ginger paste ready as a seasoning when you need it for cooking and baking, or to use for its health benefits!
Equipment
- Jar for fermenting the ginger paste - I recommend a wide mouth pint size mason jar or Bormioli Fido Jar
- Fermentation Lid - You can use a regular canning lid, but I recommend use of a Fermentation lid or Airlock.
- Blender, food processor or grater - Your preference will determine the best tool for chopping your ginger: An electric food processor or Manual chopper will finely chop it, grating will produce close to a paste, but if you want a smooth paste, you'll need to reach for your Blender or Vitamix. Or use a suribachi style mortar and pestle set.
- Pickle packer (optional) - I use an Acacia wood pickle packer.
- Fermentation weight - optional - A Glass fermentation weight is recommended.
- Funnel - optional - very helpful! Use a wide mouth funnel such as the kind that is used in canning.
- Scale (optional). - a Scale is super useful for fermenting and makes scaling your recipes so easy!
Ingredients
- approx 14 oz Fresh Organic Ginger - Fresh Organic Ginger can be purchased in bulk at Azure Standard.
- 1½ - 2 tsp Salt - I use Redmond's Real Salt or Himalayan pink salt, but you can use an unrefined Sea Salt with no additives. Don't use table salt for this.
Instructions
- Process the gingerFinely grate your ginger if you decide to use a grater. Coarsely chop or slice your ginger if you're using a blender or food processor. Finely chop the ginger to use with a mortar and pestle. Process into a finely chopped or smooth paste according to your preference.
- Measure and add the saltWeigh your ginger, you should have about 14 ounces of ginger mash to fill a pint jar, but use the gram setting for calculating the salt. Mine was just over 400g. Add 2.5% salt to this (400 x .025 = 10 grams). This is the standard formula for a dry salted fermentation. You can use a little more or less though. It's not completely scientific, since many factors play a role in fermentation, that are not cut and dry. But basically, you want it to be enough to coax out the juices of the ginger and preserve the food till fermentation kicks in, but not so much that it inhibits fermentation. If your room temperature is over 85℉ for a prolonged period, adjust to a 3% ratio.If you don't have a scale, you can use the folk method here, which is 1.5 to 2 teaspoons of salt per pint.
- Mixing the mashMix the salt thoroughly with the ginger paste. You can give the two a whirl in your processor or do it in a bowl. Then let it sit for about 10 minutes so the salt can start to draw the juices out. After that use a pickle packer or some type of food grade tamper to press out as much of the juices as possible.
- Add filtered water if necessaryIf you don't get much brine from dry salting, add a dash of filtered water to your mash.
- Packing the jarPack the ginger and salt mix into your fermentation jar. Fill to within an inch of the top. You'll need a little room for expansion here, so don't fill it to the top, leave 1-2 inches of space at the top. Keep using your pickle packer to pack it in tightly and get the juices to cover the ginger. When done, use a glass fermentation weight to weigh down the ginger paste. You'll want it submerged under the brine.
- Seal the jarIt is ideal if you can cover this jar with a fermentation lid or airlock. This will not require maintenance. Likewise, a hinged top Fido jar will also self vent and can be left alone. Otherwise, cover the jar with a tight fitting 2-piece lid, but don't tighten it too much, so gasses can escape. Do check on it every day though in case it needs to be burped. The lid will bulge when the gasses are trapped inside. Just quickly loosen the band to let the pressure out and tighten it right up again to keep any oxygen out.
- Fermenting and MaintenancePlace your jar into a darkish corner at around 70-80 ℉, somewhere where it can bubble away for a few weeks. Slip a small plate or bowl under it to catch any overflow, just in case. And then just leave it to do its thing. After 2-3 days it should start to make bubbles and you might see some seepage. Don't forget to burp the jar daily if you're using a standard canning jar lid and watch for kahm yeast (a crinkly greyish-white thin layer of yeast, that is not harmful). You'll want to skim that off occasionally so it doesn't taint the awesome flavor of your fermentation. Leave it to ferment for about 3 weeks.
- StoringAfter about weeks, go ahead and get it ready for storage. Smell it. Does it smell good, look good? Is it a good consistency? Now taste it, and if all looks good, then you can put a regular lid on it and place it into the refrigerator or root cellar to slow down the fermentation and there it should last for at least a year if you don't use it up first. Just use a clean utensil to remove what you need and close the jar back up.
- TroubleshootingIf your ginger paste turns out very dry at this point, (mine bubbled over a lot, because I had the jar a little too full, and I lost a lot of liquid) add a little finished brine from another ferment before storing, or, I like to just top it off with a little homemade probiotic vinegar, to keep it from growing mold on top.