Homemade Pickled Sushi Ginger (Gari)

I recently saw a pile of young ginger at an Asian grocery store, so I decided to make Pickled Sushi Ginger from scratch. Pickled Sushi Ginger is made from pieces of thinly sliced ginger and a sweet and sour pickling liquid. And it has a touch of heat that comes from the ginger. It is often served as a condiment for sushi.

Pickled Sushi Ginger is a perfect palate cleanser to remove the fishy taste, and in sushi terminology, it is called ‘gari’ (ガリ). It is surprisingly easy to make gari. The key is to use young ginger and slice it very thinly.

About Gari and Young Ginger

The name ‘gari’ came from a straight-out onomatopoeia of when you eat a piece of ginger. The raspy sound of eating ginger and slicing the ginger is expressed as ‘garigari’ (ガリガリ) in Japanese.

Apparently, there are thousands of onomatopoeias in the Japanese language and Japanese makes use of it three times as often as English. So, it is no surprises that a strange word like ‘gari’ is adopted to the pickled ginger.

Gari is a very simple pickle made by preserving thinly sliced ginger in a sweet and sour liquid called ‘amazu’ (甘酢). There are different recipes for amazu. Amazu is the generic name for sweet and sour flavouring.

As you can see in my recipes Crab and Cucumber Salad with Sweet Vinegar Dressing (Amazu) and Pickled Chrysanthemum Radish, the ingredients and the proportion of each ingredient can be different, but the prominent flavour of amazu is sweet and sour.

You can buy Pickled Sushi Ginger (Gari) at supermarkets and Japanese/Asian grocery stores. It might come in a plastic pack or in a glass jar. The colour of gari can be light yellow or light pink.

A very young fresh ginger contains anthocyanin pigments. When ginger is marinated in vinegar, the pigments become red by oxidation. You may notice the small reddish tip on the surface of the young ginger. If your ginger is not very young, your Pickled Sushi Ginger may not become pinkish.

The ginger that you usually find at supermarkets and vegetable shops is older ginger with thick light brown skin, while young ginger has thin, soft skin, which is semi-transparent. You may not even have to peel the soft skin when using the young ginger. The flesh of the young ginger is yellowish and much juicier.

What’s in my Pickled Sushi Ginger (Gari)

• Young ginger, very thinly sliced
• Salt

Amazu

• Konbu dashi
• Rice wine vinegar
• Sugar
• Salt

You can substitute rice wine vinegar with wine vinegar or apple vinegar.

Slicing ginger to make gari

It is important to slice the ginger as thin as possible, preferably to 0.5mm/ 1/64″ and no more than 1mm/ 1/32″. The thicker slice of ginger makes the pickled ginger spicier and the texture harder.

The large irregular shape of ginger needs to be cut into sections like the photo above, so that slicing becomes easier, and each sliced piece is not too large. The flesh of young ginger is quite soft, so you need to slice the ginger along the direction of the fibre.

It is not easy to consistently slice ginger by hand using a knife. A sharp knife certainly helps, but if you have a slicer with a 0.5mm/ 1/64″ thickness, you can make evenly sliced ginger quickly.

How to make Pickled Sushi Ginger (Gari)

1. Boil thinly sliced ginger in water with a pinch of salt.
2. Drain and let it cool.
3. Remove excess water from ginger slices.
4. Heat the Amazu ingredients in a saucepan.
5. Put ginger slices and the hot amazu in a container/jar.
6. Let it cool and place it in the fridge for a day.

Young ginger is not available all year round at vegetable shops and you may not be able to find young ginger where you live. But don’t worry, it is possible to make gari with normal ginger.

Left: Young ginger with sift skin, right: Normal ginger with hard skin.

You can make gari with normal ginger in the same way as above, but make sure that you slice the ginger perpendicular to the direction of the fibre after peeling the skin.

The gari made with normal ginger is spicier and more pungent than the one made with young ginger. The sliced ginger may not be as soft and tender as the young ginger either, but you can still enjoy the taste and crunchiness of it.

Pickled Sushi Ginger can keep for about a year in the fridge.

Yumiko

5 from 1 vote

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Homemade Pickled Sushi Ginger (Gari)

Prep Time

25 mins

Cook Time

5 mins

Pickling Time

1 d

Total Time

1 d 30 mins

 

Pickled Sushi Ginger (Gari) is thinly sliced ginger with a sweet and sour flavour. It has a touch of heat from the ginger. It is best to use young ginger, as the flesh is softer and less pungent. But you can make Gari using normal ginger as well.

Don't forget to see the section 'MEAL IDEAS' below the recipe card! It gives you a list of dishes that I have already posted and this recipe that can make up a complete meal. I hope it is of help to you.

Recipe Type: Side

Cuisine: Japanese

Keyword: ginger recipe, sushi condiment

Serves: 1 cup (approximate)

Author: Yumiko

Ingredients (tbsp=15ml, cup=250ml)

• 300g/10.6oz young ginger
• 1/2 tsp salt

Amazu

• 120ml/4.1fl oz konbu dashi
• 120ml/4.1fl oz rice vinegar (note 1)
• 5 tbsp sugar
• 1/2 tsp salt

Instructions

Preparing Ginger

1. If you have a large piece of ginger, break it into smaller round sections that are easier to slice (see the photo on the post). Trim off the small pointy bits around each piece of ginger if there are any.

2. Using the spine of your knife or a spoon, scrape off the thin skin of each piece of ginger (note 2), then place them in a bowl filled with water. Leave it for 15 minutes or so.

3. Slice each piece of ginger very thinly along the direction of the fibre (note 2). The thickness of the slices is preferably 0.5mm/ 1/64" and no more than 1mm/ 1/32" (note 3).

Making Gari

1. Put enough water to boil ginger slices in a pot. Add a pinch of salt and bring it to a boil.
2. Add ginger slices to the pot and boil for 1 minute.
3. Drain and let them cool.
4. Remove excess water from ginger slices, by pressing them hard between your palms (note 4). Put the ginger in an airtight container or a jar.

5. Put all the Amazu ingredients in a pot and heat it to dissolve sugar and salt. Turn the heat off just before it starts boiling (prolonged boiling will reduce the acidity taste from the amazu).

6. Add the hot amazu to the container with ginger. Hot amazu will make the spiciness of the ginger milder.

7. Let the pickled ginger cool, then place it in the fridge for a day before eating.

Recipe Notes

1. You can substitute it with wine vinegar or apple vinegar.

2. If you are using normal ginger with hard skin, peel the skin off and slice it perpendicular to the direction of the fibre.

3. It is important to slice the ginger as thin as possible. See more details in the section SLICING THE GINGER TO MAKE GARI in this post.

4. This is to prevent the ginger slices from getting damaged and broken.

5. Pickled Sushi Ginger (Gari) keeps about a year in the fridge.