One Thing, Three Ways: Ginger

The three products I will show you how to make, which cumulatively utilizes ginger are:

1. Pickled Ginger

2. Ginger Tea (by-product of making pickled ginger)

3. Chai Concentrate

The spiciness and warmness ginger provides is perfect in these colder months. I love sipping on a chai latte or ginger tea. Pickled ginger lasts for up to a year in the fridge, so you can make a large batch to eat with rice, sushi, or anything else you want. I use it in my homemade peanut sauce as a secret ingredient.

You can save your ginger peel scraps from making pickled ginger to make ginger tea or for chai concentrate recipe below.

Pickled Ginger

• Servings: 3-4 cups ginger
• Time: 40 minutes
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Ingredients

• 12 ounces ginger (about 2 large heads)
• 1 tablespoon salt
• 1/4 cup rice vinegar
• 1/4 cup apple cider vinegar
• 3/4 cup water
• 1/4 cup sugar

Directions

1. Peel the ginger with the back of the spoon.
2. Cut the ginger extremely thin with a sharp knife or a mandolin
3. Place the ginger in a bowl and sprinkle with the salt. Let sit for 10 minutes
4. Bring a pot of water for a boil and add the ginger. Cook for 1-2 minutes.
5. Strain the ginger, reserving the cooking liquid to drink(it is ginger tea!)
6. In a large jar or container, add the. vinegars, water, and sugar. Mix until sugar is dissolved, and add the ginger.
7. Allow the mixture to sit for 2 hours before eating. The pickled ginger will last for up to a year in the fridge.
8. Note: you can adjust the vinegar and sugar ratio to your liking. I prefer mine less sweet.

Chai Concentrate

• Servings: 1 quart
• Time: 30 minutes
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Ingredients

• 6 cups water
• peel from one orange (optional)
• 5 inch chunk ginger, grated, unpeeled
• 4 cinnamon sticks
• 1/2 teaspoon anise seed or 3 star anise pods, crushed
• 10 whole cloves, crushed
• 25 cardamom pods, crushed
• 1/2 teaspoon nutmeg, ground
• 1/2 teaspoon black peppercorns, crushed
• 5 black tea bags
• 2-4 tablespoons maple syrup
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract

Directions

1. In a large pot, add water, ginger, cinnamon sticks, anise seed, cloves, cardamom pods, nutmeg, and black peppercorns. Allow simmer for 15-20 minutes.
2. Add the black tea bags and remove from heat to let steep for 10 minutes.
3. Strain the spices and tea bags from the liquid.
4. Add the maple syrup and vanilla.
5. Store the chai concentrate in the fridge for up to two weeks.
6. Use the chai concentrate in a 1:1 ratio with milk of choice to make a chai latte.

Vegetable Scrap Broth

Save those scraps! Even if you are composting, finding a second use for your vegetable scraps is a great way to get the most out of all the food you buy.

Any vegetable scraps can be used for this broth except for large amounts of cruciferous vegetables scraps because they may impart a bitter flavors. I tend to use a majority of onion, carrot, celery, leeks, and kale scraps in my broths. Herbs such as rosemary, thyme, and sage are great additions as well. Now that I have so much stock from my vegetables scraps, I have been making amazing soups during these colder months.

When I buy a chicken, I try to fabricate the bird and save the carcass in the freezer until I have enough vegetables for a big pot of stock as well. Then, I will add all the scraps and carcass to the pot and make a chicken scrap broth!

This scrap broth is not an exact recipe, but one that can be easily bent to your preference and ingredients on hand. I fill a pot with about 4-6 quarts of water when I can fill a gallon size bag with vegetable scraps.

Bring the broth to a simmer, then reduce to the lowest setting and cook overnight on low, or for about 5-8 hours.

Strain out the scraps and store the broth in the fridge or freezer for future use in soups, sauces, or anywhere you would usually add water to give your dishes a new depth of flavor.

• Servings: 4 quarts
• Time: 5-8 hours
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Ingredients

• 4-6 quarts of water
• gallon size bag of vegetable scraps
• chicken carcass (optional)

Directions

1. Combine all ingredients in a large pot.
2. Bring to a low boil, then reduce the heat to the lowest setting and cook for 5-8 hours.
3. Strain the scraps from the broth.
4. Store in the fridge or freezer.

One Thing, Three Ways: Apples

The three products I will show you how to make, which cumulatively utilizes the whole apple are:

1. apple sauce

2. scrap apple vinegar

3. apple shrub

I have a box of ‘second’ apples that I bought for $10 at a farmers market. Since I have all these apples, I am going to show you how to use them all up! The three ways I plan to use these apples is for apple sauce, apple cider vinegar, and spiced apple shrub.

Apples chopped for apple sauce before cooking

Apple Sauce

• Time: 2-4 hours
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Ingredients

• 15 pounds apples
• 1-2 tablespoons cinnamon
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1 cup water

Directions

1. Peel, core, and chop the apples into large chunks, reserving the cores and peels for scrap vinegar.
2. Add the apples to a large pot with the water, cinnamon and salt. Cook over medium, or medium low heat for 2-3 hours until the the consistency is to your liking.
3. Allow to cool and store in the fridge or freezer.

Apple scraps before sugar water is added to the jar

One week into fermentation

Apple cider vinegar after straining the apple scraps from the liquid

Apple Scrap Vinegar

• Servings: 1-2 quarts
• Time: 3 weeks
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Ingredients

• apple scraps (cores and skins)
• 4 cups water
• 1/4 cup sugar

Directions

1. Put the apple scraps in a large glass jar.
2. Make a mixture of 4 cups of water and 1/4 cup of sugar. Dissolve the sugar, and add the sugar mixture to the space between the apple scraps in the jar.
3. Make more sugar water if the apple scraps are not fully covered.
4. Weigh down the apples so they are not exposed over the liquid with a fermentation glass weigh or a small glass jar.
5. Cover the jar with a towel or fabric and allow to ferment for 1-2 weeks until bubbles stop forming.
6. Once the bubbles stop forming, strain the apple scraps (they are compostable).
7. Return the apple/sugar liquid to the jar and cover with a cloth or fabric.
8. Allow the liquid to ferment for 4-8 weeks until sour to your liking.

Apple shrub before straining

Apple shrub strained after sitting for one week. I stored mine in a molasses jar!

Apple Shrub

• Servings: 1 1/2 cups
• Time: 5-7 days
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Ingredients

• 1 cup vinegar
• 2/3 cup sugar
• 1 cup grated apple
• 1 cinnamon stick
• 1 inch chunk of ginger

Directions

1. Combine all ingredient in a glass jar with a lid. Seal the lid. Mix well.
2. Allow the mixture to sit for 5-7 days.
3. Strain the grated apples from the liquid. Store the vinegar mixture in the refrigerator.
4. Use the shrub as a vinegar tonic drink or in cocktails.

One Thing, Three Ways: Garlic

The three products I will show you how to make, which cumulatively utilizes the whole garlic clove are:

1. garlic “butter”

2. garlic infused oil

3. garlic chips

And, instead of chopping garlic for all your dishes, why don’t you try infusing oil with it? Confit is a method of cooking slowly over a long period of time time, usually in fat. This long, slow cooking results in garlic that is creamy, sweet, and spreadable, as well as a garlic infused oil that is begging to be used in all your next cooking endeavors.

Garlic Confit

• Servings: 8 oz oil/8 oz garlic spread
• Time: 2hr 30mins
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Ingredients

• 1 1/2 cups garlic cloves, whole
• 1 cup oil

Directions

1. Add the garlic and oil to a pot.
2. Cook over low heat for 2-3 hours.
3. Separate the oil and garlic into two different containers.
4. Mash the garlic until it is uniform and spreadable

Once you use a copious amount of garlic to make garlic confit, you will have an equally large amount of the papery, seemingly inedible parts of the garlic. Stop throwing them away and start making crispy garlic chips. For the garlic chips you want to use the skin of the garlic that is closest to the head. The remaining thin layers on the outside can be saved in your freezer for vegetable scrap broth.

Garlic Paper Chips

• Servings: 1 cup chips
• Time: 20 minutes
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Ingredients

• 2 cups garlic paper chips
• 2 teaspoons olive oil
• salt to taste
• pepper to taste

Directions

1. Preheat the oven to 400 degrees.
2. Toss the garlic skins in the oil, salt, and pepper.
3. Bake for about 10 minutes until brown and crispy.
4. Add the chips to salads or other dishes for an added crispiness/saltiness.

About Me

My goal is that within this blog you’ll find inspiration to reduce your food waste in fun, accessible, and easy ways. When I was seven years old, I was introduced to utilizing food waste when I started helping make wine with my dad and his friends.  Although, at first, I only attended these long days of laborious tasks because I would get a cream filled donut and a cup of decaffeinated coffee, I grew to love them. I was able to see the progression of our endeavor, from the grape to the bottle, and enjoyed the community of friends that we formed. Once the wine was bottled, the skins, pulp, seeds, and stems (also called the pomace) were leftover. My dad would take the pomace and make grappa, a clear grape-based brandy. Grappa is an exemplary zero waste product.  While I didnt know it  then, this concept of lowering food waste would follow me throughout my life.

A few years after I corked my last wine bottle, you’d find me in high school working at Cherry Grove Farm, a small raw milk cheese, meat, and egg farm in Lawrenceville, New Jersey.   I worked countless hours per week, got stepped on by pigs, and peed on by cows. Despite this gruesome work, I loved it. At Cherry Grove Farm, my appreciation and view of food changed even more dramatically. The hard work that we poured into the food we ate made every bite more delicious. My attentiveness to food waste grew from my work there. We used rotational grazing to feed our herds of cows and heifers. The vast amounts of whey produced from cheese making was fed to the pigs. Goats were used to browse the overgrown areas. I slowly realized how little was wasted day to day.  Even the cracked eggs were fed to barn cats instead of tossing them in the trash. 

My inspiration for sustainability and food waste has grown since I last milked a cow. I’ve continued my education in Culinary Arts & Food Science, with a focus in Food Science at Drexel University in Philadelphia, PA. And I’ve gotten involved in other companies and organizations that hold the same values as me. About 30-40% of the food supply in the U.S. goes to waste which makes every little step we can take to reduce our individual waste have the potential to make an impact on climate change and greenhouse gas emissions. It is exhilarating to discover delicious uses for things people usually throw away. For instance, banana peels are edible, cauliflower greens are delicious, and carrot tops make a wonderful pesto. Education and inspiration is all most people need to highly utilize the food they buy. With Cook Clever, Waste Never I hope you find your own motivation to generate change, and make some new, delicious food along the way.