Parripak Foods add Galangal to their list of exotic products
 

Lovers of Thai and Southeast Asian cooking will be delighted to hear that Parripak Foods in Bedfordshire have started processing Galangal alongside their fresh vegetables and garlic purees.

The Galangal herb belongs to the ginger family of plants and is an Asian species, which was originally found only in the grasslands along southern parts of China, and in some places in Southeast Asia. Best known for its use in Indonesian and Thai foods, Galangal is a rhizome that is characterised externally by a dark reddish brown colour. Although it resembles ginger in appearance, it has a completely different taste. The finished puree has a strong aromatic odour and a sharp, sweet taste, which has been likened to a mix of pepper and pine needles!

The physical shape of this squat, knobbly, butter-coloured root meant the company had to re-think the best way to achieve the perfect puree. Dominic Pleasance from Parripak explained: "Because Galangal is shaped like ginger, it presents a real challenge to achieve a good puree. We have had to make various modifications to our processing machinery as it has had to work much harder to produce the consistency we require, but the end result is an extremely good product."

Galangal is particularly popular in Thai cuisine and is used extensively in green chicken curries, satay sauces, massaman curries and tom kha soups, with 'kha' meaning Galangal in Thai. Parripak says that demand for Galangal is steadily increasing and they are now processing 10kg buckets with a shelf life of 10 days, at their factory in Bedfordshire.