The 3 Ingredients You Need To Make Flavorful Pudding

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On the list of unhealthy dishes you should think twice about ordering from a Chinese restaurant, ginger milk curd, also called ginger milk pudding, isn't likely to show up. For one thing, this homely, simple dish from Shawan, China, isn't a touristy, Americanized creation like kung pao chicken. Secondly, it's wholesome, simple, and a great treat for the whole family, with only three ingredients and a delicious, mild flavor. 

All you need is whole milk, fresh ginger juice, and sugar to make this dessert. Added together correctly, the result is a custardy pudding that sets up without a thickener due to culinary magic ... also known as "chemistry." Various protease enzymes in the ginger juice react with proteins in milk — which are most abundant in whole cow's milk, so don't experiment with alternatives — to curdle the milk and set the dish into a delicious gel that has been compared to panna cotta. 

Traditionally, it should be set enough to hold a Chinese soup spoon on its surface. The pudding is lightly flavored with ginger. Many Chinese people don't have much of a sweet tooth, with dramatically low per-capita sugar consumption compared to other nations, but you can sweeten it to taste with a little extra sugar if you wish. Heating the milk to the right temperature and causing the correct chemical reaction with the ginger juice can be a bit of a tricky process at first, but your efforts will pay off in a comforting, craveable dessert that might even be the key to soothing an upset stomach.

Making ginger milk pudding is deceptively straightforward. You simply heat the milk, stir in your desired amount of sugar, and add freshly-squeezed ginger juice, which can be obtained by pushing diced or minced ginger through a fine mesh sieve (by the way, here's how to properly store leftover ginger root). Getting the temperature of the milk just right is the tough part, as generations of passing down the recipe has made this step vague. To bring ginger milk curd into the 21st century, use a candy thermometer. Generally speaking, 158 degrees is the sweet spot, while a little over one tablespoon of ginger juice will cause one cup of milk to set. The resulting pudding is uniformly gel-like in consistency and has just a gentle kick from ginger's natural spice, making it a natural treat for rainy or cold nights.

Perhaps you've heard that ginger ale is the key to help a hangover or nausea. This may be something of a placebo effect, as most commercial ginger ale contains little or no actual ginger. Real ginger contains bioactive compounds that may aid in hastening digestion which can help curtail queasiness. Consequently, you may find that, like a warm bowl of chicken soup, ginger milk pudding helps you feel better when you are under the weather, and not just because it's homey comfort in a bowl.