Bright, spicy, and slightly sweet, ginger enlivens all sorts of dishes. From crispy fried chicken to sweet cookies, check out our favorite ginger recipes.
Ginger is featured prominently in Japanese and Japanese-inspired dishes. Our Japanese-style chicken wings use potato starch to get a crispy crust and are flavored with ginger, garlic, and sansho, the Japanese equivalent of Sichuan pepper. Our kombu and squid fried rice from chef Tadashi Ono is a simple one-pot dish rich in umami and kicked up with ginger.
Steeping ginger in water with sugar yields a flavorful simple syrup to use in cocktails. The Saint is a white-wine based drink with vermouth, lemon juice, and a spicy ginger syrup. Our Japanese old fashioned has the bourbon-Angostura combo typical for the drink, but is sweetened with a ginger simple syrup made with kuru sato, or Japanese black sugar, which has a taste similar to dark brown sugar.
We also love adding ginger to sweet dishes. The bright spiciness highlights all the other flavors of a good dessert. Try our pear pie in which ginger balances the fruity filling and buttery crumble of sweet streusel. Fresh and candied ginger deliver a one-two punch in our decadent chocolate chess pie. And of course, you can’t forget gingerbread cookies. Our recipe for this holiday classic calls for cloves, cinnamon, and ginger.
Find all of these dishes and more in our collection of ginger recipes.
Sansho, the Japanese equivalent of Sichuan pepper, adds kick to these sake-and-mirin-marinated wings. A fresh squeeze of lemon brightens them up for serving. Get the recipe for Japanese-Style Chicken Wings »
Colatura, an Italian fish sauce, brings an umami note to this simple appetizer of meaty razor clams. Get the recipe for Razor Clams Fantasia »
“This is just the freshest and most refreshing juice you can drink, ever,” gushes Marcus Samuelsson about his favorite drink at Zanzibar’s night market. Feel free to add the juice—which, when fermented and distilled, turns into rum—to beer for a sweet cocktail, as some Zanzibaris do, or drink it straight, as shown here, with ginger for added spice.
Ginger, lemongrass, and maple vinegar add a warm base note to this dish, which is packed with root vegetables, and topped with a crisp greens and a poached egg.
This vibrantly orange dressing was made famous by Japanese-American steak houses. It gets its incomparably clean flavor from puréed carrot and fresh ginger. Get the recipe for Carrot Ginger Dressing »
Gingerbread cookies like these are popular in Sweden during the holidays and can be served plain or decorated with icing. This recipe comes from the 80-year-old Vete-Katten bakery in Stockholm.
A garnish of chopped peanuts and slivered cucumber and carrot add crunch to the silky, savory Chinese-American noodle dish. Get the recipe for Sesame Noodles »
Fresh ginger gives the filling of this pear pie a warming kick of spice, balanced by the buttery crumble of sweet streusel.
Before brewing this spiced ginger soda, it is important to sanitize all tools and equipment. See this site for more information, and find champagne yeast and 1-liter EZ cap beer bottles at Midwest Supplies.
Infused with ginger and black pepper, this syrup makes a great homemade ginger beer: Just mix one part syrup to three parts soda water. Get the recipe for Ginger Syrup »
This recipe, from Gluten Free Girl & The Chef blogger Shauna Ahern, appeared in our 2012 Cookie Advent Calendar. Shauna says: “Every year when my mother made her pillow-soft molasses cookies, I just sighed with happiness at the holidays. But by the time she was ready to hand over the baking, I could no longer eat gluten, and she couldn’t find that recipe. So I fiddled and baked until I came up with these.” Get the recipe for Gluten-Free Ginger Molasses Cookies »
This white wine-based cocktail from Brooklyn, New York’s Café Moto starts off summery, with the aromas of fresh basil and mint and an effervescent topper of club soda. Get the recipe for The Saint »
Puréed canned peaches form the base of this delicate soup, which is thickened with tart Greek yogurt and spiced with fresh ginger. Get the recipe for Cold Peach Soup »
You can use a bamboo steamer instead of a wok or skillet to steam the fish for this simple Taiwanese favorite. For a Chinese New Year tradition, save some of the fish for the next day to represent an abundant year.
Honey adds a contrasting sweetness to this savory grilled steak suffused with ginger, lime, and garlic.
These yellow-hued shortbread cookies from chef Chris Tan are inspired by spicy English gingerbread, as well as Dutch and Indonesian ginger cookies.
After discovering that fresh whole wasabi plants were available in the United States, Adrian J.S. Hale found all kinds of innovative uses for them, such as this butter-rich sauce in which the pungent heat of the wasabi root, or rhizome, is balanced by the delicate earthiness of the leaves for a mild heat and slight bitterness that accentuate the sweet flavor of plump pan-seared scallops. Get the recipe for Seared Scallops with Wasabi-Ginger Butter »
This one-pot sticky rice dish from chef Tadashi Ono combines sweet squid, spicy ginger, and shredded seaweed. It makes for a surprisingly satisfying, simple meal thanks to the complex layering of savory, spicy, and subtly sweet flavor.
A quick rinse in boiling water purifies the fish and concentrates its flavor in this dish from New York chef Tadashi Ono.
Writer VK Sreelesh’s in-laws live in the south Indian state of Kerala, along the Malabar Coast, where people’s diets are heavily influenced by the area’s abundant supply of seafood. One of his favorite dishes is this fried bullseye fish, seasoned with turmeric and chile powder and fried in coconut oil. While small bullseye fish or sardines are traditionally used, salmon, shrimp, or snapper, as we’ve used here, also work.
Sichuan peppercorns, ginger, and red chile flakes add complexity and polish to this versatile syrup, made by macerating strawberries with sugar and spices. We love using it in cocktails and drizzling it over pancakes and ice cream for an extra kick of flavor.
We first fell in love with these lightly spicy lo mein noodles when chef Marcus Samuelsson dropped by our kitchen to test drive some recipes for his Harlem restaurant, Streetbird Rotisserie. Laced with oyster sauce, ginger, and yuzu kosho and tossed with pickled mustard greens, the dish is a medley of sweet, tangy, spicy, and sour. Get the recipe for Sho’ Nuff Noodles »
At Los Angeles’ Lemonade restaurant, crunchy radishes, snap peas, and medium-rare seared tuna are tossed in a ginger-soy dressing for a crisp and colorful entrée salad.
Bacon adds smoky dimension to this stir-fry. It’s easily adapted to whatever leftovers you have in your fridge—roasted pork or chicken, egg, seafood, or just about any kind of vegetables. Get the recipe for Bacon and Shrimp Fried Rice »
