Winter Melons – The Guide and Recipes

This is the ultimate guide to winter melon, one of the most popular Chinese summer vegetables. It is delicious, low in calories, and an excellent source of dietary fiber. Winter melon can be cooked in many different ways such as stir-fried, steamed, boiled, or even to make a winter melon tea syrup. In this guide, we’ll look at how to choose the right melon, how to cook them with delicious recipes, and how to store and purchase tips. Although winter melon is believed to be quite plain, I love to cook with it because it can absorb the flavors much better than other common vegetables. Also, winter melon is such a great choice to balance the oily texture of a soup.

What’s Winter Melon

Winter melon, scientifically named Benincasa Hispida, is a melon that resembles a hybrid between a watermelon and a cucumber. It is a cucurbit family member, including melons, cucumbers, zucchini, squash, and pumpkins. This type of melon is easy to transport and store once harvested. Some people know winter melon as ash gourd, a mild-flavored melon often used as a vegetable in Asian cuisines, particularly Chinese and Indian cuisine. So sometimes it is also known as Chinese melon. It is often used in soups, stir-frying, braised dishes, and even in drinks.

Winter melons, despite their name, grow in warm temperatures. These gourds are native to the warm regions of Southeast Asia. However, they are widely available in other parts of the world too.

 A misleading name – Dong Gua

The name winter melon (We call it “Dong Gua” 冬瓜 in Chinese ) is quite misleading because it is not grown or harvested in winter. It usually is either seeded in later Spring or Fall.

Most of the plants are grown in spring and the winter melons are harvested in late summer or early fall. But after removing from the vine, winter melon has a long storage time until winter (up to 4 months). In winter when vegetables are not insufficient, winter melon becomes a popular ingredient. Another popular reason might be it is super great with soups. But winter is a great season for soup. Young winter melon has hair; however, it starts to lose them after maturing. Also, the hair becomes a waxy coating.

How large can a winter melon be？

Mature winter melon can weigh up to 40 pounds and a foot in length. At this size, the winter melon is round and dark green with waxy skin. You can simply look for a nice package of sliced winter melon at a nearby store for your convenience.

Winter Melon and Its Benefits

Winter melon or ash gourd white pumpkin or wax gourd is very popular in many Southern Asia countries. In China, we believe it is a super healthy ingredient because of its wide range of benefits.

• Winter melon can help lower inflammation, the main cause of chronic diseases.
• It improves the digestive system because the fruit is broken down well in the stomach.
• It contains high water and fiber, yet carries low calories, making it the best diet food. Research shows that winter melon carries 96% water, which is great for filling your thirst and helpful for watching your weight.
• Winter melon may lower the risk of type 2 diabetes by lowering blood sugar levels and insulin levels.

Can winter melon be eaten raw?

Winter melon is not for raw eating. Besides, it requires careful cooking techniques, such as simmering, braising, stir-frying, or cooking with sugar to combine the flavor into a winter melon syrup.

What does winter melon taste like?

Although the ripe winter melon is somewhat bland, the unripe winter melon has a delicate sweetness. It has a pleasant, slightly grassy flavor that has been likened to that of cucumber, although much fainter. Matured winter melons are quite firm and dense and lost their flavor to some degree. But it still has freshness.

If you tried the watermelon white rind, it tastes quite similar to winter melon. Therefore, if winter melons are unavailable, watermelon with white rind skin is occasionally might used as a replacement.

How long should you cook winter melon?

In general, winter melon is super easy to cook and needs a short time. Winter melon slices only need 4-5 minutes of simmering. For larger pieces used in braised dishes and soups, 20 minutes is long enough. You have to be careful while cooking because the fruit could get squishy if overcooked.

How to store winter melon

If you bought a whole one, the perfect storing method is to keep it in a cool and dry place as a whole and unwashed. Once it is cut, winter melon can last up to one week when stored in the refrigerator, wrapped with plastic film.

How to select and buy winter melon

When you go shopping, try to select a winter melon that is dense and firm. Avoid those with bruises, cuts, or moldy spots on the surface.

Prepare winter melon for cooking

In most cases, you will get winter melon already cut into 10cm thickness pieces. You need to remove the hard skin and the seeds completely. Then you can either cut it into slices for stir-frying, large cubes for braising, or super large pieces for soups.

Tip:

I recommend keeping some of the green skin in order to keep the shape after cooking. By the way, this can also enhance the flavor and increase the fiber content.

Winter Melon Soup

Winter melon soup is light and refreshing. It is a simple dish made with peeled winter melon, pork ribs, ginger and some seasonings. Winter melon soup has many health benefits due to its low sodium content and high fiber content. You can also make a winter melon soup with meatballs. To make the winter melon soup, check recipe here.

Winter Melon Tea

Wintermelon tea and winter melon milk tea have been satisfying taste buds around the world! Traditionally it is a summer popular drink. But it spreads to neighboring countries like China, Vietnam, and India with a new form of winter melon milk tea.

Watermelon tea is a type of drink made with syrup-like liquid. There are two ways of making winter melon tea. Sometimes after harvesting, the gourds are dried until they turn into what looks like large white cubes with thin green rinds on the outside. To make the tea itself, these cubes are boiled together with the sugar until they dissolve into a thick syrup-like liquid. Or this tea can be made from fresh winter melon too just like what we did in this recipe. To make the tea, the syrup-like liquid is mixed with water or milk tea. The resulting drink is sweet yet subtly fragrant with hints of cinnamon or cardamom. Very unique and definitely a large group of lovers.

A braised winter melon with minced pork

I love to introduce a braised winter melon with minced pork recipe. With a small portion of minced pork, the winter melon chunks taste as good as meat.

Instructions

Remove the hard skin but keep some tender green parts. Then further cut into 5cm wide chunks.

Heat the wok and add oil 1 tablespoon of oil, and place the winter melon chunks in. Cook for 5 to 6 minutes until the winter melon chunks are slightly seared on the surface. Transfer out.

Add another 1 tablespoon of cooking oil, and fry minced pork until crispy. Move them to one side of the wok, and continue fry garlic, ginger and scallion until aromatic.

Return the winter melon. Mix well. then pour in 2 cups of warm water. Cover to simmer for 5 minutes.

Return the winter melon and then pour in 2 cups of warm water. Cover to simmer for 5 minutes.

Take the lid, and add light soy sauce, dark soy sauce, white pepper and salt. Mix 1 tablespoon of cornstarch with 1 tablespoon of water. And pour the water starch in. Mix to thicken the sauce.

At last, drizzle some sesame oil, add chili pepper and scallion sections. Mix well.

Serve with steamed rice. The sauce is so good to describe and more importantly, healthy!

Quick winter melon stir fry with black beans

Winter melon can be stir-fried simply with sauces and condiments. My favorite way is to fry them with fresh peppers and fermented black beans.

Ingredients

• 200g winter melon – sliced into 1 cm thick slices.
• 2 fresh peppers – cut into small pieces.
• 2 tsp douchi- fermented black beans
• 2 fresh Thai peppers- cut into small circles
• 2 cloves garlic – chopped
• 2 tbsp. vegetable cooking oil
• 1 tbsp. light soy sauce
• 1/4 tsp. sugar

Instructions

• Peel and cut winter melon into 1cm thick slices.
• Add 1 tablespoon of cooking oil and then fry the fresh green pepper until seared. Sprinkle a pinch of salt.
• Heat the wok, and place the winter melon slices indirectly. Fry for 2 minutes until the surface becomes seared. Then add around 1 tablespoon of water to fasten the cooking process.
• Add another tablespoon of oil, and place in garlic, fermented black beans, light soy sauce, and sugar. Return sauteed green peppers, and give everything a big stir fry to mix everything well.