Thanis Lim

All Rounder Chef and Food Journalist

Chinese Dessert: Ginger Milk

It's time I post some recipe from my Chinese roots. This recipe is a common dessert in China, Taiwan and Hong Kong. It should taste like tofufa but with a nice kick of ginger. This is said to be good for women for relieving menstrual cramps but ginger has always been used traditionally to soothe the stomach. Some people will love it while some will not like it. Give it a shot and you might find a healthy tasty dessert for life if you love the taste and texture. This is something you can have anytime of the day (and night).

Ginger milk curd (Chinese: 薑汁撞奶), also known as ginger-juice milk curd or simply ginger milk, is a Chinese dessert originated in the city of Shunde in the Guangdong Province in southern China. The main ingredients are ginger and milk.
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Ginger contains protease. When milk is added into ginger juice, protease reacts chemically with the protein in milk. Then, one kind of protein in milk would change from a water-soluble form to a water-insoluble form, and leads to the formation of milk curd.

To get ginger juice, you would shread the ginger (without the skin ah!) and after that squeeze the shredded ginger through a fine cloth or filter to get it's juice. Use old ginger if possible.

Ingredient: This is for one bowl's worth
115ml milk
1 tsp sugar
1 - 2 tsp ginger juice (preferably from old ginger)
a few drops of white vinegar (to help curdle the milk)

Method:
1. Put ginger juice and vinegar into a bowl.
2. Heat milk with sugar and stir. Once it reaches a simmer (little bubbles form), take off the heat IMMEDIATELY.
3. Stir for one to two minutes with a spoon . (This is to lower the temperature - see picture below for a better method but more work!)
4. Pour mixture into the ginger juice and vinegar bowl and stir it once. Leave it to set. Do not disturb the mixture for around 10 minutes.
5. Once curdle, serve it warm. (Texture of this is very soft)
6. For a firmer texture, you can steam it for 6-8 minutes on low heat.

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Alternatively for step 3, instead of stirring, you can use teh tarik style and pour in and out of two containers around 10 times. This really helps cool down the milk faster and I highly recommend this step.

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Taken from a Taiwanese site, pour the warm milk on bowls of ginger juice and vinegar (This is step 4)

Note: Since blogger has been a pain in the ass to upload - I used imageshack to host the pics instead this time.

8 comments

8 comments :

  1. Anonymous2:58 PM

    Yess!!! I'VE BEEN LOOKING FOR THE RECIPE ALL NIGHT!!! ^____^'' THANK YOU! I will try this out tomorrow(=

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  2. Anonymous8:51 PM

    I tried your recipe - it's nice! But I think I put in too much ginger. Do you think it will work with soya bean milk?

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  3. i make this just now. But mine dun curdle leh.. er ust liquid
    Oh do u think i didn't cook the milk (thick enough)?

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  4. It's either you didn't heat the milk enough or you din cool down the milk enuff. Technically the acid from ginger n vinegar should curdle the milk.

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  5. Hi,
    You mean i should let milk cool down a little , then only pour to the ginger juice?

    Actually, i tried this once (long time ago) uses old ginger.

    This time, i used young ginger (the milk dun curdle)

    ReplyDelete
  6. Hi,
    I try making this again.
    This time, the milk did coagulates but not hard like tau hu hua. More like yogurt!
    Do you think i get it right? Is the texture suppose to be like that?
    Thanks
    sukkimi@hotmail.com

    ReplyDelete
  7. Wow, thanks for posting this! I've only done this successfully once in the past, but failed countlessly after that. I never knew what went wrong.

    I duly note that I should cool it down first, pour it in and stir only once. However, if you want a firmer texture, you steam it only after you have stirred once correct? I'm trying to make sure I got this right. Is that correct?

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  8. Anonymous4:19 PM

    nice post

    ReplyDelete