On 03/08/2011 12:45 PM, Steve Freides wrote:
> We had a thread about this a month or three ago - we've been
> experimenting and I'm reporting in:
>
> Our most recent batch was about 1 cup of peeled, chopped ginger root,
> cooked in 3 cups of water and 3 cups of sugar for 90 minutes. This made
> great tasting ginger syrup. Our previous attempts, using less simple
> syrup, gave us ginger syrup that wasn't sweet enough, although the
> candied ginger from both processes was the same to our taste. So:
>
> 3 cups of water
> 3 cups of sugar plus more to coat ginger pieces at end
> 1 cup peeled, sliced (about 1/4" thick) ginger root.
>
> Combine 3 cups of sugar plus the water in a pot, heat on high, stirring
> every minute or two, until the sugar is completely dissolved and the
> mixture is boiling.
>
> Add the peeled, sliced ginger, bring back to a simmer, let cook for 90
> minutes or even a bit more, stirring once in a while (every 15-30
> minutes or so is plenty).
>
> Put a large enough bowl under a strainer, pour everything from the pot
> into the strainer, let the ginger drain for a few minutes, shaking the
> strainer to help get rid of excess liquid.
>
> On a piece of parchment paper, sprinkle sugar, spread out ginger pieces
> from strainer, turn over once or twice to be sure you've coated all of
> the ginger pieces. Ginger will be soft - let dry this way as much as
> you like, move to storage container of your choosing. We like to let
> ours dry out and have fairly hard pieces of candied ginger, but you can
> move to an airtight container sooner rather than later and the ginger
> will stay moist.
>
> Ginger syrup is lovely in tea, we find, as well as useful for homemade
> ginger soda.
>

When I started doing my own ginger a few months ago I realized that
there were so many slightly different recipes that it must be just about
fool proof. Why only one cup of ginger with all that syrup? I always do
at least a pound at a time.

I did have a problem drying the ginger enough that the added sugar would
not dissolve in residual juice.