Small-Batch Kimchi – Easy Vegan Recipe

This has been my favourite small-batch homemade kimchi recipe for many years now. It’s my version of traditional kimchi – milder and without animal-based ingredients, so it can be suitable for vegans.

Kimchi is traditionally made in Korea by fermenting a combination of vegetables (usually napa cabbage and Korean radish) with a spicy paste. It’s a delicious and healthy savoury side dish. Kimchi can also be an amazing ingredient for other dishes, such as soups or stews.

Like all fermented foods, kimchi is full of probiotic microorganisms that are very beneficial for your digestive system and the whole body. With this easy recipe, you’ll learn how to make a small batch of delicious (vegan) kimchi at home.

Homemade small-batch kimchi ingredients

To make a batch of this delicious vegan kimchi at home, you’ll need the following ingredients:

• Napa cabbage (Chinese leaf)
• Korean radish, daikon, or any long white radish variety
• Green onions or Asian chives (buchu)
• Carrot
• Onion
• Garlic
• Ginger
• Hot pepper flakes – gochu-garu (Korean chilli) or other dried chilli flakes
• Red sweet pepper powder or flakes – optional, I use it to get the real kimchi flavour without too much spiciness. If you can handle very spicy food, you can substitute the sweet paprika with more hot pepper flakes.
• Soy sauce
• Nori algae sheet
• Glutinous rice flour a.k.a. sticky rice flour – for making porridge to bind the spicy paste, it’s not the same as regular rice flour, this one makes the porridge perfectly gooey
• Maple syrup, date syrup or muscovado sugar
• Salt
• Water

Traditional kimchi includes some different ingredients and ratios: it should taste more spicy and usually contains more rice porridge, some fish sauce and even chopped seafood. I adjusted this recipe to fit my gentle Balkan taste buds and vegan feeding habits at the time.

To make a more authentic version of kimchi, you can follow this recipe with a few little tweaks when preparing the spice paste: make the rice porridge a bit thinner to be able to add more hot pepper flakes, replace soy sauce with fish sauce and add Korean salted fermented shrimp (Saeujeot) to the paste.

Saeujeot actually helps to start the fermentation of kimchi because of the naturally present microorganisms. Still, the fermentation will happen without it too.

I left all of these out of my kimchi recipe because many of my friends follow a strictly vegan diet and I want them to be able to eat it. Instead of these, I add nori algae for the seafood flavour, which works amazing.

Napa cabbage gives kimchi its well-known texture, but if you can’t find it where you live, you can still follow this recipe with another type of cabbage. Napa cabbage leaves are much more tender and crispier than the typical European cabbage so it won’t be the same, but it’ll still turn out nice. 

Carrot, daikon radish and green onion are optional but a nice addition to kimchi’s flavour and texture.

As for the spiciness level – feel free to adjust it to your taste. If you can handle very spicy food, replace some of the sweet paprika in the recipe with more of the hot chilli flakes. If you like it milder, replace some of the chilli with sweet paprika.

How to make kimchi at home

This small-batch kimchi is very easy and fun to make. Here are the steps to make a delicious vegan kimchi at home:

1. Prepare the napa cabbage leaves

First, make the brine for soaking cabbage: mix water with salt in a 10:1 volume ratio (in this case, I used 8 cups of water and 1 cup of sea salt), in a large bowl. 

Divide the napa cabbage head into four slices lengthwise: don’t cut all the way through, but rather slice the cabbage from the middle towards the base and pull the two halves apart so as not to destroy the curly leaves on top. Repeat the same process with each half, ending up with four wedges.

Submerge the cabbage wedges in the brine, ensuring they are completely covered. Place a plate and a smaller bowl filled with some water on top of the cabbage to keep it submerged. Leave the cabbage in salty water for two hours.

After two hours, rinse the cabbage under cold running water.

2. Prepare the spicy paste

While the cabbage is soaking in the brine, you can start preparing the spicy paste.

In a small pot, combine 1 tablespoon of glutinous rice flour with ½ cups of water. You can add more water to make a thinner paste (porridge), but not more than ¾ cups. Thinner sticky rice porridge is good if you plan to add more dried chilli flakes than I wrote in the recipe below.

Bring it to a simmer over low heat, stirring constantly with a silicone spatula or a wooden spoon to dissolve all the sticky rice flour in the water. Cook for a few minutes over low heat, until it thickens and turns translucent. Mix constantly.

Remove the rice paste from the heat, let it cool a bit, and add dried chilli pepper flakes and sweet red paprika flakes (or only chilli if you prefer it super spicy; see more in the recipe card).

Cut a sheet of nori into small, thin pieces and mix them into the paste.

Dice fresh onion, garlic and ginger as finely as you can. You can also cut them in a food processor. Add the diced fresh ingredients to the hot and sweet paprika paste and mix to combine.

3. Slice the rest of the vegetables

If you are using carrots, daikon and green onion or chives, slice them into long strips. You can use a vegetable peeler, a julienne slicer or a mandolin slicer for carrots and daikon.

4. Combine and Mix

Optionally, cut the napa cabbage wedges in half lengthwise again for thinner pieces.

Add the sliced carrots, daikon, and green onions (or chives) to the bowl with the cabbage.

Add the spicy paste and massage it well into the cabbage leaves and all the other vegetables to ensure they are evenly coated. Consider wearing gloves to protect your hands if you have sensitive skin.

5. Jar and Ferment

Pack the kimchi tightly into a clean glass jar, pressing down gently to release any trapped air. Leave a small amount of space at the top of the jar.

Close the jar. If you use a jar with an air-tight lid, you’ll need to open it regularly to remove the pressure. A jar with a screw-on lid will need a bit less attention since you can choose how tightly you close it. You can close it loosely so that the carbon dioxide from fermentation doesn’t build up. Or, if you decide to close it tightly, open it once a day to let the gas escape.

Store the jar at room temperature (around 68°F / 20°C). After a few days, it will already taste a bit sour and likely be ready to eat.

There is no specific rule for when the kimchi is done. It can be eaten even before you jar it and leave it to ferment, it’s actually really delicious like that, freshly made. I always eat some fresh kimchi straight away because I cannot resist, but I leave most of it to ferment because I love the health benefits of fermented foods. 

After two to three days at room temperature, you can give it a taste and decide if your kimchi is ready, or if it needs another day, two, three… to reach the perfect level of sourness. It will also depend on the temperature of the room.

It is generally ready to eat after 3-5 days, but it will continue to improve in flavour. It’s usually good to put it in the fridge after five days or so, to slow down the fermentation. Kimchi will continue to slowly ferment in the refrigerator, developing more complex flavours over time.

So, in short, some general tips for fermenting kimchi are:

• Observe the fermentation – keep an eye on the jar during the initial fermentation. Some bubbling is normal. If some of the leaves rise up because of the air that got trapped beneath them, press them gently with a fork to keep them submerged. 
• Since kimchi usually ferments quite quickly, it is not absolutely necessary to use fermentation weights. But, if you don’t like to press it down with a fork every day, you can definitely use the weights!
• Taste the kimchi periodically to see if it has reached your desired level of sourness.

Storing homemade kimchi

After the fermentation is done and the taste is sour enough for you, transfer your jar of kimchi to the fridge and keep it there to prevent it from over-fermenting. It should be good for a year, probably even longer.

However, the sooner you eat it, the better its probiotic effect will be. After some time, some of the beneficial bacteria may decline in number. So it’s ideal to consume homemade ferments within a few months for the best effect.

I sometimes end up with some year-old ferments in my fridge, most often kimchi or sauerkraut. Even though those may be lower in their probiotic power than freshly made ferments, I don’t toss them because they are still perfectly edible and tasty. I like to use them in cooked dishes such as stir-fries, soups or kimchi pancakes.

How to use kimchi

What to do with kimchi? Besides just eating it as a delicious side dish, here are some ideas for easy meals with kimchi:

Kimchi wraps

Add some kimchi to these keto flaxseed wraps filling to spice it up. My perfect combination is some cooked rice, grilled tempeh cubes, tahini dressing and homemade kimchi. Yum! Check out my easy flaxseed tortilla wrappers to make these delicious gluten-free tortillas for your next lunch or dinner.

Kimchi pancakes

There are many ways to make kimchi pancakes, and this is one of my favourites: mix it with savoury pancake batter to get the kimchi evenly covered (not too liquid altogether) and fry in a pan with a bit of coconut oil or a dry pan if possible.

Check out my recipe for these amazing savoury pancakes with wild garlic.

Use the same recipe with kimchi instead of wild garlic. For the best result, first strain the kimchi vegetables from the liquid. You can use that liquid in the pancake batter for more flavour.

Savoury polenta cake with kimchi

I love to make this savoury polenta cake with various kinds of vegetables. This is an easy and adaptable recipe, so you can easily swap the zucchini with homemade kimchi if you enjoy its strong flavour. Or, just add a bit of kimchi for a bit of kick. Again, drain the liquid and chop your kimchi into smaller pieces before you use it in the recipe.

Kimchi fritters

Follow this easy sowthistle and chickpeas fritters recipe, but instead of sowthistle, use kimchi. No need to cook kimchi because it’s already soft. Just make sure it’s not full of liquid when you add it to the fritters batter, to prevent thinning it down too much.

Bao buns with kimchi

Add some chopped kimchi to these homemade bao buns’ filling to make it extra flavourful.

Mushroom Bao Buns

Kimchi sandwich

Combine your favourite bread, a delicious spread, some protein such as smoked or marinated tofu, a few slices of avocado, fresh greens and kimchi into the most delicious sandwich for breakfast!

Here are some bread recipes…

Spelt Sourdough Bread Recipe

Spelt and Oat Soda Bread

Pumpkin and Cornmeal Soda Bread

…and some great spreads and dips…

Parsley and Chives Pesto with Cashews and Sunflower Seeds

Eat the kimchi raw

If you care about the probiotic effects and health benefits of fermented foods, it is always best to eat them raw. Feel free to add kimchi to your salads or sandwiches, or just snack on it straight from the fridge.

Homemade kimchi equipment

Here’s what you’ll need to make a small batch of kimchi at home

• Large bowl for preparing the cabbage and mixing everything
• Wooden cooking spoon
• Silicone spatula
• Fermentation jars
• Fermentation weights
• Optionally, you can get some of those fermentation jars with airlocks and fermentation weights included, to make the whole process extra easy
• If you are more than just a fermentation enthusiast, a ceramic fermentation crock with ceramic weights is probably the best thing to use for fermenting kimchi (or anything else). It’s closest to the old, traditional fermentation methods and looks great too.

Yield: 2 jars

Easy Homemade Kimchi (Vegan and Less Spicy)

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This easy small-batch vegan kimchi recipe is great for fermentation beginners. The ingredient list is adaptable and the kimchi can be made less or more spicy to suit your taste.

Prep Time 2 hours 20 minutes

Total Time 2 hours 20 minutes

Ingredients

• 1 head of napa cabbage ~ 1 kg
• 1 medium-sized carrot
• ½ Korean radish or daikon root
• 2 green onions or a small handful of buchu (Korean chives)
• 1 medium-sized onion
• 1 sheet of nori algae
• 4 large cloves of garlic
• 1-2 cm of fresh ginger
• 2-3 tsp hot pepper flakes (gochu-garu or other ground chilli)
• 2 tbsp dried sweet red paprika powder or 3 tbsp flakes
• 1 tbsp glutinous rice flour + ½ cup water
• 1 tbsp maple syrup, date syrup or muscovado sugar
• 4 tbsp soy sauce
• 200 g sea salt, or ⅘ cup
• 2 L water, or 8 cups.

Instructions

1. Prepare the soaking brine for cabbage by mixing 4/5 cup sea salt with 8 cups cold water.
2. Cut the napa cabbage into four equal pieces lengthwise (as shown in the pictures). The best way to do it is by sticking a knife to its middle, facing the stem (base), and proceeding to cut all the way to the stem. Then, the rest is divided by hand, pulling the halves apart until separated. This keeps the curly leaves whole.
3. Soak the cabbage slices in the salty solution for 2 hours at room temperature.
4. Meanwhile, prepare the spice paste: mix 1 tbsp glutinous rice flour with ½ cup water and bring to a boil.
5. Let it simmer over low heat while constantly stirring for a few minutes - until it thickens and becomes more translucent.
6. Remove the pot from the heat and add maple syrup or other sugar of your choice.
7. Wait until it cools down a bit and add sweet and hot pepper flakes, blended (or finely chopped) onion, garlic and ginger, and finely chopped nori sheet.
8. Cut the carrot, daikon and green onions into very thin pieces.
9. Remove the cabbage from the salty water and rinse it a bit under running cold water to remove most of the salt. After rinsing, set the cabbage wedges on a dry kitchen cloth to dry them a bit.
10. Put the cabbage wedges, carrots, daikon and green onions in a large bowl. Add the spicy paste and use your hands to mix it well with the vegetables until all the cabbage leaves and other veggies are covered. Use gloves if you have sensitive skin.
11. When it's well mixed, roll the cabbage leaves together with carrot, daikon and green onions and put them into a glass jar. Fill the jar, leaving about an inch (2,5 cm) of space at the top.
12. Press everything gently to remove any trapped air.
13. Put the lid on the jar and let the kimchi ferment at room temperature. In my experience, it should take between 3 days and a week for it to get as sour as I like it, but you should give it a taste every once in a while to see if the sourness is up to your taste (there is no wrong or right).
14. As the fermentation goes on, the microorganisms will release carbon dioxide and there will be some bubbling. If the leaves float above the brine during fermentation, gently press them back to ensure they are submerged. You can also use fermentation weights to avoid this and make sure the vegetables on top don’t go above the brine and get exposed to air.
15. Once the taste gets to your desired sourness, keep kimchi in the fridge to slow down the fermentation. 
16. Store your kimchi in the fridge and it will be good for many months! If you have some older kimchi that still smells and tastes good, you can use it for cooking too.

Notes

The amount of the spice paste ingredients, especially sweet and hot pepper flakes, can be increased up to double if you want a stronger kimchi flavour. This includes sticky rice and water too. If you’ll be adding more pepper flakes, I would recommend just adding more water to that 1 tbsp of glutinous rice to make the porridge thinner.

If you want a completely raw kimchi, you can skip the rice paste and just make a paste from blended onion, garlic and spices. Rice paste is good because it makes the spices stay on the leaves. Also, if you like it spicier, add some more hot pepper powder (I can't stand too much of it, so this is a milder version).

Different types of chilli will have different heat levels, so definitely adjust the amount according to your taste.

I almost always let my kimchi ferment at room temperature for about five days, so it’s already quite sour before I put it in the fridge. For bigger batches, you can also allow a slower fermentation - leave it at room temperature for the first two days, and then transfer it to the fridge to ferment slowly.

The type of jar to use is up to you - I sometimes use air-tight ones (with a metal lock), and sometimes just regular jars with screw-on lids. If you use an air-tight jar, open it once a day to remove the pressure from the gas formation during fermentation. A screw-on lid is a bit safer because it usually opens by itself if the pressure builds up inside. You can, but don’t have to screw the lid very tightly for successful kimchi fermentation. I’ve tried it all (air-tight, tightly screwed, lightly covered), and it all worked great. It’s only important to let the gas escape to avoid building pressure inside of the jar.

Fermentation weights are a great way to keep the vegetables from floating above the brine and coming in contact with air. If you don’t have anything to use as weights, you can gently push the vegetables back down every day. Keeping the vegetables submerged will keep them safe from spoiling.

If you like to ferment vegetables regularly, fermentation jars with airlocks are super useful. They make the whole fermentation process more effortless.

Another cool thing to have as a fermentation lover is a ceramic fermentation crock with ceramic weights.

Start to taste your kimchi after a few days at room temperature to know when it reaches your desired sourness. Then, store it in the fridge. There will still be some fermentation going on, but it will be happening very very slowly. I just ate some 6-month-old kimchi from my fridge and it did get a bit more sour, but the taste is still as amazing as it was when I made it. That said, it’s best to consume it within six months or so for the best health benefits. Older kimchi is still good to eat if it looks and smells good (most likely it will - this stuff doesn’t really go bad that easily). I like to use my old batch kimchi leftovers for cooked dishes such as stews or kimchi pancakes.