Asian-Style Short Ribs and a Ginger Tip

This is one of my daughter's all-time favorites (my husband's, too). I adapted the recipe from a fussier braised recipe in Fine Cooking #060 (October/November 2003). This past winter, we probably had it 3 times a month.

3 lbs short ribs (or any other stewing beef, in fairly large hunks - I prefer boneless beef ribs)
1/4 cup soy sauce
1/4 cup dry white wine (darn, what will you do with the rest of the bottle?)
~6 fresh roma tomatoes, coarsely chopped (I use garden romas that I freeze whole in the fall)
4 green onions, chopped into 1-inch pieces
2 whole star anise
4 cloves garlic, crushed or minced (I've used good-quality powdered, in a pinch)
A 1-inch piece of fresh ginger, peeled and sliced into ~6-8 slices (I've used good-quality powdered, in a pinch)

Throw everything into crockpot, stir to mix, and cook on low, all day. Serve with rice or egg noodles - the gravy is really flavourful.

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I also want to pass on a tip that I got from my mom just recently. She wraps hands of fresh ginger in foil, then puts it in a ziploc bag and freezes it. When she needs it, she just shaves the skin off the chunk that she needs and the frozen finger grates beautifully on a microplane.

I have a chunk of fresh ginger in my freezer right now to see if it is still "sliceable" when it thaws, or if it goes mushy. Even if grating is the only option, this will really reduce the amount of fresh ginger I throw out in a year!