Dehydrate and powder ginger

Ginger is one of the widely used spice in Asian food. The anti-inflammatory and antioxidant properties in ginger can improve the immunity of the body. Consuming ginger tea or a medicinal ginger concoction on an empty stomach, in the morning, could keep away many diseases and strengthen the immune system.

Dry Ginger (sonth) is used in chutneys, teas, some spices and masalas which then are used in curries, marinades, gravies, etc. It is also something you can add to cookies and other sweets where you would like have the flavor or hint of it without chunks coming in your mouth.

I had been looking around to get a good brand of dry ginger powder but most of them didn't taste good, so made my own at home. As we don't have balcony or an open area I didn't have a place where I can put ginger under sun to dry well. There is a food dehydrator available but wasn't keen on getting one that's when I saw the way to do it in oven.

Drying ginger is a time taking process, so be patient! Also a quarter cup of dehydrated/dried ginger yields 1 good tablespoon of powder.

Ingredients :

1 cup ginger

Method :

• Check the ginger as if there are lots of fiber in the ginger then it would be difficult to grind into a fine powder.

• Wash and clean the ginger well. Scrape off the skin and cut them into thin round or oval shapes. As thin the pieces are it would easy for them to dry.

• I spread them on the parchment paper in a baking pan and put it inside the oven on 50-60°C temperature. It took 3.5 hours for them to dry. It would have helped if the pieces were more thinner. Make sure you check ginger on the interval of 30 minutes.

• Once dried, keep them out for at least an hour before grinding it to powder. Always sieve the powder to remove the ginger fibers.

• Store the powder in airtight container. Also don't throw the ginger fibers, store them and add to your tea.