Farmacy And Pickling
Quick and Easy Kimchi
If you love to make kimchi at home but don’t live near an Asian market, it might feel like a lost cause trying to source ingredients for the popular Korean condiment. But after living in a small town with limited access to ethnic food, I’ve found a way to adapt my usual homemade kimchi using ingredients from my local grocery store—and the flavor is as authentic as you can get.
Ingreadient
- 5 pounds napa cabbage
- 1/2 cup flaky sea salt or kosher salt
- 1 1/2 cups julienned daikon
- 1 1/2 cups julienned carrots
- 1 1/2 cups thinly sliced leeks (white and light green parts only)
- 6 scallions, cut into 1-inch segments
- 1 apple, cored and chopped
- 2 cups water
- 1 to 1 1/2 cups gochugaru (depending on heat preference)
- 1/2 cup fish sauce
- 1/2 cup finely chopped onion
- 1/2 cup finely chopped garlic
- 1 1/2 tablespoons minced ginger
Direction
- Cut the cabbage into quarters lengthwise. Remove the cores and thinly slice the cores. Roughly chop the rest of the cabbage into 1-inch pieces.
- Pile all of the cabbage into a huge bowl or basin; you can also use your sink if it has a stopper.
- Sprinkle the salt over the cabbage and cover with cold water. Every 30 minutes or so, turn the cabbage over with your hands to distribute the salt evenly. Massage the leaves with your hands to expel more moisture each time.
- After 1 1/2 to 2 hours, strain the cabbage in a large colander and rinse with clean cold water. The leaves should be soft and limp, and the volume of cabbage reduced by half.
- In a large bowl, combine the cabbage with the daikon, carrots, leeks, and scallions. Set aside.
- In a blender, puree the apple, water, gochugaru, fish sauce, onion, garlic, and ginger until well blended. Pour the sauce over the vegetables in the bowl, and toss to coat. I use a pair of “salad hands” for this task, but if you want to mix it all together with your hands, be sure to don a pair of gloves so you don’t get the fiery red pepper sauce on your skin!
- Transfer the kimchi and all the sauce to clean jars, leaving 1 to 2 inches of headspace in each jar to allow room for expansion. Tamp down on the kimchi with a spoon to help release more liquid from the vegetables and keep them submerged in the sauce.
Don’t worry if it looks like there isn’t enough sauce in each jar; as the vegetables start to ferment, they’ll release more liquid overnight. Just remember to keep tamping down on the vegetables each day to expel more liquid and help them stay submerged. - Loosely cover the jars with lids (you don’t want to tighten them too much, as the fermentation gases need space to escape) and place them on a baking sheet or shallow pan to catch any overflow of liquid.
- Leave the jars out at room temperature, away from direct sunlight, for three days. You’ll start to see small bubbles in the jars, signs that the kimchi is fermenting properly.
On the third day, use a clean utensil to taste the kimchi from one of the jars. If it has a pleasantly tangy taste (thanks to all that beneficial Lactobacilli bacteria brewing in your kimchi) and the flavors are balanced (not too salty or too pungent), the jars are ready to be refrigerated.
