Quick Kimchi

I've been thinking of trying my hand at kimchi for a while and as I'd ended up with spare courgettes the other day, I looked round for a recipe involving courgettes and I came across this one. The recipe also calls for cabbage and I had some left over from the cabbage rolls I made a couple of weeks ago, so things worked out quite nicely.

Ingredients

1.5 l water
3 tbsp salt
600 g cabbage coarsely shredded
400 g courgettes cut into 4 cm thin strips
3 tbsp grated fresh ginger
1 large clove of garlic, pressed
2 tbsp Korean chilli powder (gochujang)
1 tbsp sugar

Method

1. Place the water in a large non-metal bowl and stir in 2.5 tbsp of the salt.
2. Add the cabbage and courgettes into the water and leave for about 12 h, stirring occasionally.
3. Scoop out the vegetables and transfer to a side bowl, but keep the brine.
4. In a small bowl, mix together the ginger, garlic, chilli powder, sugar and the remaining salt, then stir the mixture into the vegetables.
5. Transfer the vegetables into glass jars, packing as tightly as possible. Add any liquid the vegetables might have released and top up with the saved brine.
6. Place a piece of baking paper over each jar and secure with a rubber band. Let stand in room temperature for 3 days, the jars should start bubbling a little.
7. After 3 days, taste the kimchi. If it tastes nice, put lids on the jars and store in the fridge, if not, leave for longer and taste every now and then until ready.

We ended up leaving the kimchi for one extra day. The only thing is, the courgettes went quite mushy and neither Lundulph nor I liked them much. But the cabbage was really good. I'll try to remember to get spring onions, like in the original recipe next time. But I'll swap the courgettes for carrots. Lundulph also suggested beet root, though the whole thing will end up purple. Hm, perhaps with red cabbage...