the.com/galangal
ginger's tougher cousin who studied medicine and refuses to be substituted
means A pungent, citrusy-piney rhizome related to ginger, widely used in Southeast Asian cooking — especially Thai curries and tom yum soups.
from The word traveled a long road: it comes through Old French 'galingal' from Medieval Latin 'galanga,' which traces back to Arabic 'khalanjān.' That Arabic form is thought to derive ultimately from Chinese — possibly 'gao liang jiang,' meaning the ginger of Gaoliang — carried westward along the spice routes, each language reshaping the sound a little as the root itself changed hands across continents.
- botanical kin
- shares the family with ginger and turmeric
- flavor
- sharp, piney, citrus-pepper bite, not just hot
- medieval fame
- prized cure-all in old European apothecaries
- thai backbone
- essential in tom kha and curry pastes
- too tough
- too woody to grate like ginger
thai cuisine — essential rhizome in tom kha gai and other southeast asian dishes, used for over 1000 years in thailand
greater galangal — alpinia galanga species native to indonesia and malaysia, larger and more pungent than lesser galangal
lesser galangal — alpinia officinarum species from southern china, smaller rhizome used traditionally in chinese medicine since 12th century