Easy Homemade Kimchi Recipe
Kimchi is a delicious addition to meals and adds a healthy probiotic kick for added gut health. With this homemade recipe you can make your kimchi as spicy or as mild as you like it.
Confession: While I love kimchi as much as the next guy, making it is really my Husband’s endeavor. With each fresh batch I strive to be a trusty sous-chef and cheerleader, chopping and tidying alongside as he works his magic, but the recipe and kudos belong entirely to my better half.
Previous Post: Grow Your Own Food: Kimchi Edition
This past weekend I awoke to find the process already underway (15 years into our marriage, I’m keenly aware that there’s no stopping my man once he starts a project. This is not a complaint.); so though I missed the front end of preparations, I hastily retrieved my go-go-gadget camera phone to snap pics whilst he charged on like a freight train. Here’s what I gleaned by observing from the sidelines:
As with all ferments, this is a several days long process… plan accordingly.
Ingredients
- 2 heads Napa cabbage
- 1 Daikon radish julienned
- 1 cup carrots julienned
- 1 head of garlic peeled and minced
- 3 green onions thinly sliced
- 5 Tbs Korean Red Pepper Adjust according to taste
- 4 Tablespoons sea salt
Instructions
- Day One: Core and rough chop nappa cabbage into 2” lengths.
- Add to a large bowl of salt water and soak for 24 hrs on counter.
- Rest a plate on top to keep cabbage fully submerged; cover in plastic wrap.
- Day Two: Strain cabbage and thoroughly rinse.
- Return to bowl and set aside.
- Chop radish and carrots into matchsticks, mince the fresh garlic, and use kitchen shears to slice the green onion.
- Toss together with pepper powder and just enough water (a few ounces) to create a thick paste that will coat the vegetables.
- Add veggie/pepper mixture into the large bowl of rinsed cabbage and mix with hands until evenly coated.
- Pack tight into sterilized jars or crock.
- Leave an inch of space on top for the fermentation gasses. Close jars and leave out on the counter 24 hours.
- Day Three: Open each jar to release gasses (this should be audible), then transfer jars to the refrigerator or cold storage.
- Day Six-Eight: Kimchi is now ready to eat! But we prefer to wait about ten days for best flavor.
Notes
- If you don’t grow your own green onions, keep them in a jar on the windowsill and they will regenerate indefinitely.
- Kimchi can have serious kick, so go easy with your first batch and increase spiciness if desired in the next go-round.
Hi there, great question. 🙂
The photos of this batch are from day #2 of the process, so the liquid (which is a by-product of the fermentation process) has yet to form. I’m happy to update with an updated photo, next week, of the day #10 status where you will certainly find it to have more liquid.
Kimchi in stores has a liquid. Yours doesn’t? Just post please on Facebook. I do not do e mail.