hey welcome back to better done yourself.
today on better done yourself: white kimchi!
I made a kimchi a couple of... well
about a year ago now that I just
finished up. I've been eating it for a
while and a lot of people complain that
it's too spicy. can they do something
else instead of two cups of hot peppers?
or you know "hey I can't find gochugaru"
oh I don't know what that is or
you know there's a lot of funny Asian
ingredients in it! A couple of people
complain that I'm not Asian and I
shouldn't be making kimchi! So I present
to you: White Kimchi which is basically
kimchi but kimchi if you look at the
definition for kimchi it's fermented
vegetables kimchi can be anything you
take your pick and it's basically the
Korean take on fermented vegetables so
what I want to do is just a couple of
white vegetables or no kind of like
white chili it's you know sort of green
stuff so I'm gonna do well let me show
you from my weight kimchi I'm gonna do
some napa cabbage ginger it's a little
bit of Asian pear some scallions daikon
radish a bunch of garlic and salt so
real simple recipe if you can't find
napa cabbage that's fine use you know
regular white cabbage if you can't find
pears use an apple use a bartlet pear!
it doesn't matter. kind of closer to you
know the kimchi I would probably make
sure I'd some garlic in it I would
definitely make sure had some ginger in
it you can use scallions you can use
white onions you can use red onions if
you can't find this actually went to
three stores to find one of these today
use some red use some red radishes and
it'll make the whole the whole mix on
the nice pink color so you can make pink
kimchi but have some fun with it you
know you really when you do ferments like
this don't get real bent out of shape that
you can't find exactly what I used
but whatever you want in it if you want
it to be somewhat kimchi like make it
mostly vegetables and it'll be kimchi
don't sweat it
let's get this stuff cut up I like to
start my kimchi out with kind of a paste
a little bit of us like a flavor slurry
so I'll do that with the food processor.
I'll do all of the garlic this is a
dozen cloves of garlic
and then probably not all of this ginger
but a good bit of this ginger you can
I'm going to use the back of the knife
and just scrape the dried skin off then
you can put the skin in I used to use
the skin all the time and then someone
said well you know the skin is really
not a great flavor why are you cooking
with the the skin and I taste a little
bit of the skin and I started comparing
some of my recipes with and without skin
and realized you know what I think that
for as easy as ginger is to peel I'm
peeling ginger from now on let that take
two seconds so ginger and garlic said
and these a couple of Asian pears this
is just for a little bit of extra
sweetness of course as you know when
you're fermenting you don't really get
sweetness out of sweet things but they
give a nice flavor they give a nice you
can peel these if you want I'm just
putting them in and then a little bit of
salt will help just chop all this stuff
up you want to use sea salt you want to
use Himalayan salt you want to use
kosher salt don't use anything with
iodine in it because iodine you know
kills bacteria so and we're trying to
foster bacteria so pick your favorite
kind of fermenting salt I've got some
links to this salt down below the Celtic
sea salt 2 tablespoons for what I reckon
I think I'm gonna end up with about a
gallon of this so we'll see how we come
along here this
we grind
I've got my my Cuisinart spatula here so
they don't tear up all my spatula
collection on you know it gets caught on
a blade you know it's really dense a
spatula so I was just use the same one
all right we've got our paste ready next
bench me once you've got your ginger
garlic paste go ahead and start chopping
up the vegetables not me is the tops
they're a little withered and gross
looking but the restaurant size get your
scallions in there next to the radish
how you process this is completely up to
you whatever you like I think we could
actually do something traditional with
it just do little julienne they're kind
of nice think about when you're making
something like this think about how do
you what you want the texture of the
finished product to be think about what
you want these little bits to look like
so here we can do our disks these are
probably too big I mean you could do
disks maybe you could do like some
little half moons about half that
thickness I think what I want to do with
mine is just continue on this julienne
frenzy here and just make some little
literally make matchsticks out of them
you
like I said whatever works for you don't
cut your fingers cut up the bench
oh my got a cabbage here this guy we can
do in the traditional style the Koreans
will split the root and then tear the
cabbage apart that gives you all this
nice kind of ruffled texture makes it
come out real nice look at that
from there I'm gonna do probably a half
inch wide slices of cabbage the thicker
stuff will you get into these thick ribs
of these the thick parts I slice real
thin because that's a real tough type of
edge so I'm gonna go down to just
julienne of that stuff we're self around
the root there I'm not gonna use that
right so to start out big get smaller
and smaller as you go
get your ginger-garlic pear mixture in
here if you're really dealing with too
much volume of cabbage and veg
just let it sit for a couple of minutes
and the salt will actually suck a lot of
moisture out of the vegetables and
you'll see the water to sort of beating
up on the on the cabbage but at this
point you remember how much we were
dealing with a minute ago it's literally
been about 10 minutes and I can fit it
all in one bowl now so just give it one
final mix and let's taste it when you're
fermenting a lot of people think we'll
yeah half a lot of salt they don't want
use that much salt you really don't have
to use a lot of salt you don't I mean
the salts they're kind of as a as your
safety belt that's your seat belt just
to make sure that you don't have a lot
of mold growing you don't have a lot of
bad bacteria getting into the mix if
you've got good clean hands good
stainless steel clean bowls there's not
a lot to worry about you can do this
with literally no salt use a little salt
salty it's good and just barely taste
the soap I think I'm gonna have maybe
just one more tablespoon of salt to this
and we'll mix that in real well at this
point getting into some jars get it into
your crock into your fermentation crock
amusingly hafgan like a widemouth jars
here and I'm just literally gonna scoop
it up and dump it in Thanks catch basin
here always go for speed you have a
pickle packer yet and what you want to
do is just kinda crush it in there and
eventually you see it I've got these
bubbles I've got this juice coming up
that's what you're going for you're
trying to get a little bit of juice so
you know that there's no air bubbles pop
down in there all right that one's full
so I ended up with well 2 quarts and two
pint and a half's but I didn't want to
put these into another big jar because
you really you want to minimize the
amount of what's called headspace in
your ferments you don't want a lot of
air in here you don't want a lot of
oxygen near your fermenting vegetables
so it's best to really try to get your
ferment into suitably sized jars so you
I ended up with this kind of a little
collection of jars so at this point you
really you want to make sure you you've
got your jars pretty full you don't want
to leave a lot of headspace you don't
want to leave a lot of room a lot of
oxygen on top of the cabbage we're gonna
seal these up so we're gonna push all
the vegetables down and get that cabbage
juice coming up which is why I ended up
in these smaller jars I didn't want a
jar when the big jar is half-full of my
white kimchi push all that down in there
now you need some kind of a weight you
want something to hold the vegetables
down in Norridge essentials sent these
along these are really nice there are
little weights that you can use and
they're literally kind of like the
pickle pebbles we've seen at some of the
other videos but they've got a little
grip in them so you can kind of grab a
hold and place them right down and where
you need them so these are really nice
just go ahead and set these right down
give them a little push and
that used to come up just gonna add a
little bit of water on top of that now
we have another issue so we still have
this bunch of air in here here's another
neat product while soap endorsed
essential is the easy fermenter
what this is is these fancy lids that
have a one-way seal in them so what they
give you is this real nice plastic cap
with a silicone seal a silicone one-way
valve and a little date let's see today
is the second so you can go ahead and
just roll this around to the two so you
know when you sealed them up you put
these on here and crank them down they
have a little lever that you can use to
get it open with and this valve as these
things remember these things off gas
these create carbon dioxide and instead
of having to open them every day and
burping them
ught the little valve lets air out now
remember there's oxygen there's air in
there when I closed it up so they also
send along this neat little pump that
you can use stick it on there and
literally evacuate all the air out of
the jar now I was worrying about that
air not anymore
there's no air in this jar I've
literally admit a vacuum in this jar and
I can just leave that sitting on the
counter so I've got luckily they sent me
a whole box of these crank that down on
there got my extractor pump they suck
the air out look at the look it's all
moving remember we left some headspace I
can see you guys get let's see the
bubbles coming out all of that is oxygen
in it that will cause rot and I'm
literally sucking all the oxygen out of
my ferment and I definitely have a
I can barely pull this up it's sucking
it back down to itself so there's that
one set my date code and my third jar
that actually worked out real well but
that nice you know hard plastic and the
silicone seal I'm not even concerned
about putting this on today because
again I got that lever that I can pop
the seal on it and suck the air out yeah
that's great look at all the look at all
the air coming out of it so there's some
voids in there but I don't think there's
any more air in there it's just just all
vacuum cuz I'm not getting any more air
that's a great vacuum pump all right
these are all set I got my date code set
I've got my white kimchi all done so
I'll just set these in the cabinet and
let them go for a week or two and then
give one a taste and then if it's not
done put the cap back on put the
extractions back pump back on and suck
the air out of it again let it go for
another couple of days if you taste one
and it's like perfect it's just like you
like it put in the fridge that's just a
rest the fermentation process and stops
it right where it is senator cat says
that fermenting is really it's it's odds
on a spectrum it's really you know
there's fresh vegetables and there's you
know totally sour almost ahead of it of
vegetables you like them somewhere along
here so when it gets to right where you
like them put them in the fridge arrest
that fermentation process and you'll
keep them just be flaky light if you
like them sour and miserable and just
you know too sour that anyone else in
the house won't eat them fine put them
in the pantry leave them in the pantry
they'll they'll preserve themselves the
the lactic acid that's created by the
bacteria on the cabbage by the lactam
actors will create an acid that will
preserve these and they will keep this
is a practical preservation process so
be sure to enjoy all the pots nourish
essentials like the easy fermenter and
the vacuum pump and let me know how it
worked out for you hit the links below
and check them out on Amazon take care
of you guys see you next Thursday night
