galangal

Galangal, Malay lengkuas, Mandarin (Traditional: 南薑/Simplified: 南姜, also termed as: T:高良薑/S:高良姜), Cantonese lam keong (藍薑, also known as blue ginger), is a rhizome with culinary and medicinal uses, best known in the west today for its appearance in Southeast Asia cuisine but also common in recipes from medieval Europe. Though it resembles ginger in appearance, it tastes little like ginger. In its raw form, galangal has a soapy, earthy aroma and a pine-like flavor with a faint hint of citrus. It is available as a powder from vendors of Oriental spices and is also available whole, cut or powdered from vendors of herbs. A mixture of galangal and lime juice is used as a tonic in parts of Southeast Asia. It is said to have the effect of an aphrodisiac, and act as a stimulant. Galangal is also known as laos (its Indonesian name), galanggal, and, somewhat confusingly, galingale, which is the name for several unrelated plants of the Cyperus genus of sedges, also with aromatic rhizomes.
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Noun
1. southeastern Asian perennial with aromatic roots
(synonym) Alpinia galanga
(hypernym) ginger
(member-holonym) Alpinia, genus Alpinia, genus Zerumbet, genus Languas
2. European sedge having rough-edged leaves and spikelets of reddish flowers and aromatic roots
(synonym) galingale, Cyperus longus
(hypernym) sedge
(member-holonym) Cyperus, genus Cyperus

(n.)
The pungent aromatic rhizome or tuber of certain East Indian or Chinese species of Alpinia (A. Galanga and A. officinarum) and of the Kaempferia Galanga), -- all of the Ginger family.
  

Known as laos (Indonesian), lengkuas (Malaysian), kah (Thai), isen, or galingale. It is sometimes called Java root or Siamese ginger. Galangal is a fresh root (a rhizome of a Zinginber species) that resembles fresh ginger root, but has a thinner, translucent, striped skin. Often, it has pink shoots. Its texture is tougher and its flavor is more citrusyand more astringent than ginger. It is always used in cooked dishes and never eaten raw. If you can't find it, ginger is an adequate substitute.

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