Cooking With Fresh Ginger

If you've never cooked with fresh ginger, you're in for a treat. Powdered and crystallized ginger are nice, too, but fresh ginger is a totally different taste. It adds a burst of sweet spiciness to your recipes.

The first time I bought this knobby brown root, I was completely intimidated. I made a huge mess when I tried to peel it because it was so juicy and fibrous. Grating it with my cheap box grater was a joke. So I did what I always do when I have a cooking question: I looked online, and I discovered the Microplane rasp grater.

I literally rushed out and bought a set of three graters from J C Penney. I think I paid about $30, and it was worth every penny. I grated the ginger effortlessly, and I was overjoyed as I watched the fine flakes drifting like snow into the bowl. (Okay, so I don't get out much!)

Since then, I've used fresh ginger in many recipes, and I keep it on hand in my freezer. Here's what I've learned:

Storing Ginger
When you buy ginger, immediately cut it into thumb-sized pieces and seal them in a sandwich bag. Put them in the freezer, and they'll keep for months.

A thumb sized piece yields about two tablespoons of grated ginger.

Don't thaw the ginger before using it. It's much easier to peel and grate when it's frozen.

Peeling Ginger
Scrape the edge of a spoon against the ginger to remove the skin. If you have a decent vegetable peeler, that will work also, but it wastes a bit of the good part.

Make sure you get all the skin off, or your grated ginger will be stringy.

Grating Ginger
Use the Microplane grater with the finest perforations. It's easier than grating cheese. Just be careful because the blade is extremely sharp.

Rap the tip of the grater firmly against the bottom of your bowl to dislodge any ginger that's stuck to the back of the blade.

Ginger Equivalents
Use triple the amount when you substitute fresh ginger for ground. For example, if a recipe calls for 1 teaspoon of ground ginger, use 1 tablespoon of fresh.

Note: The Microplane graters are great for a lot of other things besides ginger. You can zest lemons, limes, and oranges. You can easily grate chocolate, hard cheeses, apples, potatoes, and nutmeg. I frequently sprinkle fresh nutmeg on soups, sweet potatoes, and carrots. I also use nothing but freshly grated parmesan, which makes the simplest pasta dish a little fancier. You've gotta get the Microplane graters!

Storing Leftover Chopped Vegetables

For years, I would buy an onion or green pepper, use a fraction of it, and either throw the rest away or let it rot in the crisper drawer. About a year ago, I had a brainstorm.

Now, I always chop the entire vegetable. (This is very easy to do now that I have the Vidalia Chop Wizard.) I use what I need for my recipe and freeze the rest in a sandwich bag. I have all kinds of chopped vegetables in my deep freeze, and this saves me a lot of time when I'm throwing together a weeknight recipe.

It is not necessary to thaw the veggies before using. It's a good idea to double bag onions so that they don't stink up the freezer.

Tip: To break up the solid mass of chopped veggies so you can measure what you need, throw the bag forcefully against the counter top several times. (This is kind of fun!)