living in the woods and making stuff

I saved baby bok choi from my CSA share for a week and a half to have enough for this recipe (it requires for about 4 baby bok chois). Kimuchi is a Japanese style kimchi, that I found in my usual canning book, Joy of Pickling. The recipe is normally made with napa cabbage, but Joy of Pickling suggests that you can use other types of cabbage as well. Since we reliably get bok choi in our CSA, I decided to try it instead.

The cabbage is sliced into sections, ready to be salted…

…and pressed overnight.

Salting draws out the moisture in the cabbage, and works as a preservative. The salted cabbage ends up looking quite shriveled.

I chopped the salted bok choi  into 1″ squares, and added slivered carrots, grated apple, and the usuals: ginger, garlic, green onions, salt, and hot pepper. I used a little less hot pepper, to experiment and see what happens.

The kimuchi now has to sit, loosely covered, for a few days before it is ready. My last batch has been living in my fridge now for about a month, and it seems to get better with time. The flavors aren’t quite as sharp…