Korean Soy Sauce Pickled Radish (Ganjang Mu Jang-Ajji) | 간장 무 짱아찌
Pronounced: Gahn-nahng Moo-Jahng Ah-Chee
What: A classic, traditional pickle Koreans eat by transforming daikon radish into a sweet, soy sauce marinated pickle. Once pickled, this radish pickle is used as an ingredient to create delicious banchans (side dishes).
Taste: Balanced levels of sweetness and soy sauce in a pickled, crunchy radish. Quite addicting.
How It’s Made: Chop radish. Layer and cover in sugar. Wait 1-2 days for sugar to turn into liquid. Discard liquid, and add in soy sauce and plum extract. Let it sit for 3 days, and you will have delicious radish pickles.
What to Serve it With:
Once you have the pickles, you can eat it as is or turn it into a banchan (sidedish). Recipe to be posted soon!
Add this into kimbap, bibimbbap, pork belly noodles, etc.
Definitely eat with rice to even out the saltiness.
Notes & Tips:
You can easily half this recipe. Just be mindful of the soy sauce and plum juice ratio.
There are no measurements (except for the soy sauce to plum juice ratio) in this recipe because it’s not required!
Plum extract is required. This extract is something many Koreans have in their pantry to season their food. You can find it at any Korean Grocery Market in the cooking syrup/sauces aisle.
We use CJ Brand.
Korean Soy Sauce Pickled Radish (Ganjang Mu Jang-Ajji) | 간장 무 짱아찌
Ingredients:
Instructions:
- Wash daikon radish. Skin off any “ugly” marks on the skin of radish. Chop in half and then chop the halves into 3 pieces.
- In a large air-tight container, lay 1 layer of radish at the bottom. Coat radish in sugar by big handfuls (be generous with the sugar—literally dump in sugar by the handfuls!). Repeat until you layer all radish in sugar.
- Put the lid on the air-tight container and let it sit for 1-3 days. On the next day, rotate the top layers of radish with the bottom layers of radish to ensure even distribution. Check on it each day. You are ready for the next step when: all sugar has turned into liquid and the radish has pruned. or until all the sugar turn into liquid.
- Once your radish has pruned and all the sugar is now liquid: take out the pruned radish and discard all liquid. Put pruned radish back in the container and add in 2 cups of plum extract and 5 cups of soy sauce (2 to 5 ratio). Keep adding this ratio mixture until the radish is leveled with the liquids. Make sure you rotate the radish around the next day so that the radish are repositioned while fermenting.
- Let it sit for 3 days, and you will have radish pickles! Remove from container and place it into smaller, air-tight containers. Chop it up when ready to create delicious side dishes (recipe here).
Notes:
instructions with visuals
Wash daikon radish. Skin off any “ugly” marks on the skin of radish. Chop in half and then chop the halves into 3 pieces.
In a large air-tight container, lay 1 layer of radish at the bottom. Coat radish in sugar by big handfuls (be generous with the sugar—literally dump in sugar by the handfuls!). Repeat until you layer all radish in sugar.
Again, add in BIG handfuls of sugar over each chopped radish. Put the lid on the air-tight container and let it sit for 2-3 days. On the next day, rotate the top layers of radish with the bottom layers of radish to ensure even distribution.
Check on it each day. You are ready for the next step when all sugar has turned into liquid and the radish has pruned.
Once your radish has pruned and all the sugar is now liquid: take out the pruned radish and discard all liquid. Put pruned radish back in the container and add in 2 cups of plum extract and 5 cups of soy sauce (2 to 5 ratio). Keep adding this ratio mixture until the radish is leveled with the liquids.
Make sure you rotate the radish around the next day so that the radish are repositioned while fermenting. Let it sit for 3 days, and you will have radish pickles! Remove from container and place it into smaller, air-tight containers. Chop it up when ready to serve.
This is such a traditional recipe that reminds me of the old times of Korea. It’s a great way to ferment and make use of your daikon radish. It’s so delicious and opens doors for more recipes (side dish recipe here). Hope you enjoy it!
Eat Well,
Sarah