Galangal

Kaempferia galanga
Lesser Galangal (Alpinia officinarum)
Galangal rhizome ready to be prepared for cooking

Galangal /ɡəˈlæŋɡəl/[note 1] is a rhizome of plants in the ginger family Zingiberaceae, with culinary and medicinal uses originating in Indonesia. The rhizomes are used in various Asian cuisines (for example in Thai and Lao tom yum and tom kha gai soups, Vietnamese Huế cuisine (tré) and throughout Indonesian cuisine, for example, in soto). Galangal is related to and resembles ginger. While ginger tastes a little like galangal, most cooks who use both rhizomes would never substitute one for the other and expect the same flavor profile.

In its raw form, galangals have a dissimilar taste from common ginger. They are available as a whole rhizome, cut or powdered. The whole fresh rhizome is very hard, and slicing it requires a sharp knife. A mixture of galangal and lime juice is used as a tonic in parts of Southeast Asia. In the Indonesian language, the greater galangal and lesser galangal are both called lengkuas or laos, while Kaempferia galanga is known as kencur. It is also known as galanggal, and somewhat confusingly galingale, which is also the name for several plants of the unrelated Cyperus genus of sedges (also with aromatic rhizomes). In Thai language, greater galangal is called "ข่า" (kha) or "ข่าใหญ่" (kha yai), while lesser galangal is called "ข่าตาแดง" (kha ta daeng). In Vietnamese, greater galangal is called riềng nếp and lesser galangal is called riềng thuốc.

The word galangal, or its variant galanga, can refer in common usage to four plant species all in the Zingiberaceae (ginger family):

Polish Żołądkowa Gorzka vodka is flavoured with galanga.

Footnotes

  1. Also known as galingale /ˈɡælɨŋɡl/, galanga /ɡəˈlæŋɡə/, and blue ginger. Names in other languages include Vietnamese: "riềng" IPA: [ɾiəŋ]; Laos: ຂ່າ "kha" IPA: [kʰāa]; Thai: ข่า "kha" IPA: [kʰàa]; Burmese: "Ba dae gor"; Indonesian/Malay: lengkuas (Alpinia galanga); Khmer: រំដេង [1] "Romdeng"; Mandarin Chinese: 南薑 or 高良薑 (traditional Chinese characters), 南姜 or 高良姜 (simplified Chinese characters), nán jiāng or gāo liáng jiāng (Pinyin) IPA: [nan˧˥ tɕjaŋ˥] or IPA: [kaʊ˥ ljaŋ˧˥ tɕjaŋ˥]; Cantonese Chinese: 藍薑 laam4 goeng1 (Jyutping) IPA: [lɑm˩ kœŋ˥].

References

  1. "Galanga". Khmer Online Dictionary. Retrieved June 2, 2014.

Further reading

External links