
Ginger milk curd (2014) - polm23
https://blog.khymos.org/2014/02/24/ginger-milk-curd/
======
ortusdux
This is the perfect application for a sous-vide. If you place a wire rack
below the water line you can make a very accurate bain marie. You can easily
maintain +/\- 1 degree. I've been using mason jars to make individual yogurt
servings, puddings, and custards. I might have to add this to the mix.

~~~
morsch
I've been meaning to try mason jar custards. Any other good vegetarian sous
vide applications? I was gifted a Joule, but I pretty much only use it the
four or five times a year I treat myself to a good steak or some such.

Sous vide carrots weren't as revelatory to me as they were to others. Like
many other veggie recipes they also need rather high temperatures, and a
vaccuum machine instead of zip loc bags.

~~~
Gatsky
I have never had luck with sous vide vegetables. The high temperatures
required also raise concerns about the stability of the plastic bags.

~~~
ortusdux
I do recommend reusable silicone Sous Vide bags. You cannot vacuum seal them
directly, but you can submerge them in water to drive the air out. You can
also place them inside a vac bag, pump down, press the seal close, and then
remove them from the vac bag.

~~~
morsch
I don't. At least the ones I got gifted[1] fight you every step of the way.

The silicone is very thick and stiff. It's hard to remove air by submerging
them, depending on what you put in there, there are always some pockets of air
remaining. And the way they seal is very fiddly. One of the sealing clips
broke after a few uses. Maybe it gets easier with experience, but some things
just shouldn't be that aggravating.

On the other hand, a cursory search shows that there are many other products
available that may be more sensibly designed.

[1] PureSiliconeWare is the brand name

------
ebg13
All the talk about myths and then it says funny things like:

> _Place juice in a bowl and pour milk into the ginger juice from a height to
> allow sufficient mixing._

Surely the flow of the pour is more important than the height. You can get
complete mixing from very low height and poor mixing with a lot of splatter
mess from high height. The difference is in how rapidly you pour, not from
where.

> _Do NOT stir as this will interfere with the gel formation._

"Make sure they mix, but don't mix them!" is a weird bit of advice. Perhaps it
should say don't stir continously.

~~~
amelius
Perhaps they meant don't mix into a homogeneous substance (?)

~~~
regularfry
I'd read it as saying that the important structure formation happens in the
first second or so of the mixing, so if you have to put the jug down, pick up
a fork, and start to mix it, you'll be damaging that structure.

------
anfractuosity
Neat, I'm going to have to try that, the graphs & diagrams are really nice.
It's interesting how narrow the temp window is for it to gel. That kind of
reminds me a bit of controlling the mashing temp. in brewing to keep the
enzymes happy.

I was looking at this recipe again recently for ginger beer:
[https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/wordofmouth/2011/ju...](https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/wordofmouth/2011/jun/29/how-
make-real-ginger-beer)

I've used the ginger beer plant a while ago, but it seems somewhat hard to get
now and apparently the 'National Collection of Yeast Cultures' have it, but
can't sell it as they're not sure of the exact composition alas. Maybe time to
try 'making' it myself :)

------
msla
> Some weeks ago, while doing research for Texture on gel formation in foods
> where no “external” hydrocolloid is added, I came across ginger milk curd
> (in Chinese: ????).

I don't know if this person needs to look up the Chinese for "ginger milk
curd" or if there's a character encoding issue.

------
YeGoblynQueenne
While this is indeed very interesting and I enjoyed the detailed chemical
analysis thoroughly, I have to say that it doesn't look like it's particularly
useful at least not as an ingredient in a larger recipe (edit: and it's too
much of a hassle to just enjoy on its own). The quick syneresis means that you
can't make cheese with it, for one thing. It also means it won't easily go as
a topping to confectionery. Perhaps frozen as a topping to ice cream?

I confess it's the first time I hear of ginger curd so I don't know what it's
usually supposed to be used in.

Anyway the article is really interesting and I also thought that the
following:

    
    
      Kitchen myths arise when people randomly fail and succeed with a recipe. 
    

Is the kind of sentence that could launch 300 HN comment threads :)

~~~
jefftk
_> it's too much of a hassle to just enjoy on its own_

On its own it's a traditional Chinese dessert:
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ginger_milk_curd](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ginger_milk_curd)

------
rlue
Anybody know what this is supposed to be called in Chinese? The article just
shows four question marks. (I thought it was an encoding error at first, but
after curling the page and inspecting the character byte sequences, it looks
like they're really just question marks.)

~~~
ww520
This shows the characters and a demonstration video. It's literally "ginger
juice collides milk."

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6lJukAU_STA](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6lJukAU_STA)

~~~
kaybe
What did she do wrong for the 3 that did not work?

~~~
ww520
It seems she's demonstrating the experiment with different temperatures and
different ginger juices. There are two temperature ranges and two ginger juice
types (one filtered and one unfiltered old ginger). The only success case is
the one with unfiltered ginger juice at certain temperature. I'm guessing the
unfiltered juice has ginger starch/fiber in it which helps the milk to
crystallize at the right temperature. Crystallization requires "seeds" to
serve as the nucleus to start the process.

I'm guessing two essential factors are temperature and some fiber material
like ginger root. Other fruits with the right kind of fiber might work too.

~~~
mleonhard
The article contradicts what you say here. It provides a detailed explanation
of how the ingredients form a gel.

------
Scaevolus
I made this once. The final product has a mild flavor and delicate gel, and
juicing ginger is extremely tedious.

It's a good chemistry demonstration, but from a culinary perspective I'd
recommend infusing a normal custard or a ginger milk tea if that's what you
want!

~~~
calf
I hope you realize "from a culinary perspective" this is a classic Cantonese
dessert. Cantonese cooking is a renowned cuisine, and calling the ginger milk
curd a chemistry demo is culinary ignorance, and marginalizes the heritage of
many Asian Americans.

------
lawkwok
I made this once and maybe the proportions were wrong, but it was much too
gingery for me. Also, I also felt bad using so much ginger for such little
yield.

I prefer the British posset, which is made by heating heavy cream and adding
sugar and lemon juice. You could even add spices and ginger to possett.

------
kleer001
I bet it tastes great. However, the research and chemistry diagrams are the
best part.

------
weeksie
I just gave it a shot and it was pretty tasty, but i wonder if it's stable
enough to be strained like yogurt. Might give that a shot next time.

