dubu jorim (tofu braised in soy and mirin)

Ideal quick takeout-style weeknight protein! Sweet, savory, vegetarian, and super affordable.

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Ingredients:

• 1 pack 16 oz firm tofu
• 1/2 yellow onion sliced
• 4 tsp vegetable oil (canola or any other mild flavor oil)

Sauce:

• 3 T Soy Sauce (dark soy sauce)
• 1 T rice wine (mirin)
• 2 T water
• 1/2 – 1t. sugar (original calls for 1 -2 tsp sugar; 1tsp. was quite sweet but not too sweet; anything more would probably be too sweet for me)
• 1 tsp red chili powder (less if using a chili besides mild Korean gochugaru. I used Indian red chili powder, and probably used about a half-teaspoon, and it was just barely mild, so I recommend about 3/4t. to 1tsp. cayenne or other hot chili powder.)
• 2 green onions chopped
• 1 tsp roasted sesame seeds
• 1 tsp sesame oil

Directions

1. Cut up the tofu in half and then into 1/3 inch (0.8 cm) thick slices

2. Heat the oil in a frying pan on medium heat.

3. Fry the tofu about 5 min. on each side until lightly browned.

4. While the tofu is being cooked, make the sauce and set it aside.

5. Add sliced onions to fried tofu in pan. Stir gently.

6. Pour the prepared soy mirin sauce mixture onto the tofu stack. Make sure the sauce is distributed evenly throughout.

7. Turn the heat to medium and immediately lower to simmer when sauce starts to bubble.  Simmer for 20 min. until the sauce is mostly gone.

Serve hot with rice or congee, along with veggies like blistered green beans, or cold as a salad, appetizer, or banchan, along with a cold and refreshing cucumber salad, bean sprouts, or radish salad.

original recipe by kimchimari – adapted by friedsig

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Fantastic quick dinner. Tastes a lot like a takeout meal, with that sweet and savory sauce. Addictive. The braised onions come out really fantastic and sweet. I recommend this to anyone looking for a takeout-style quick weeknight meal!

Tip: If you’re like me and don’t often fry slices of tofu (I’m currently addicted to soft tofu, like mapo tofu and soondubu jjigae!) remember not to fry them too “hard” or it may come out too chewy!

Tagging this with “rotation” so I remember to make it again. Check out the ROTATION tag for more of my go-to meals!

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kimchi bokkeumbap (bulgogi and kim chi fried rice)

cooking a lot of korean food lately. can’t wait to try this!

BULGOGI

1 pound of beef tenderloin, sliced thinly into pieces ½ inch x 2 inches and ⅛ inch thick
(or 1 lb mushrooms for a vegetarian version)

Marinade (for 1 pound of beef):

½ cup of crushed pear
¼ cup onion purée
4 cloves of minced garlic
1 chopped green onion
2 tbs soy sauce
2 tbs brown sugar (or 1 tbs of brown sugar and 1½ tbs rice syrup) (optional; the pear is so sweet!)
a pinch of ground black pepper
1 tbs toasted sesame oil
several thin slices of carrot

Add the beef to the marinade and keep in the fridge at least 30 minutes. If your cut of beef is tough, you can marinate longer to soften it.
Cook it on a pan or a grill, and transfer to a plate or a cast iron plate to serve.
Sprinkle chopped green onion and toasted sesame seeds over top.

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kim chi fried rice

3 bowls overnight cold rice
1 cup ripe kimchi (including juice)
200g pork belly (3 layer pork)
1/2 medium onion, sliced
1/4 medium green capsicum, diced
1/4 medium red capsicum, diced
2 cloves garlic, finely chopped
1 teaspoon gochujang (Korean chili paste; add more if you prefer spicy)
2 tablespoons soy sauce
1 teaspoon sesame oil
3 tablespoons cooking oil
dash of black pepper
1 spring onions, chopped
eggs

1. Fry eggs sunny side up in oil. Set aside.

2. Add oil in a wok and saute onions until translucent.

3. Add garlic and pork belly and cook thoroughly.

4. Once pork is cooked, add red and green capsicum.

5. Add gochujang and kimchi. Stir-fry for a minute.

6. Add rice, soy sauce and kimchi juice. Stir to combine well.

7. Lastly add sesame oil and dash of black pepper. Serve topped with fried egg, spring onions, and shredded seaweed or seaweed rice seasoning.

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adapted from maangchi and messywitchen

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totally delicious! the pear adds such a great sweetness to the meat. recommended!

kimchi bibimbap

“stirred rice” – rice stirred up with leftovers!

+ last night’s rice
+ any leftovers you have in your fridge – meat, veggies, whatever
+ bolgogi (sweet korean rib-eye cooked with pear,) if you have it lying around. (you can leave it out.)
+ cut-up pieces of raw fresh veggies, like cucumbers, bean sprouts, carrots, or spinach
+ a handful of kim-chi, cut up
+ a fried egg
+ a gojuchang sauce made of 3 tablespoons Gochujang paste, 1/2 tablespoon apple cider vinegar, 3ish minced cloves of garlic, 3 teaspoons soy sauce, 1/2 tablespoon Korean fine red pepper flakes, 1 tablespoon dark sesame oil, and 1/2 tablespoon sesame seeds
+ a topping of dried and salted seaweed

mix together and eat

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based on a recipe from heart mind and seoul

5-minute gochujang korean hot pepper sauce

made this for a friend with little bites of fried popcorn chicken, and she asked if i could make her a tub of this sauce to keep in the fridge.

the best part is that it takes less than five minutes to prepare.

this was created as a dipping sauce for fried food, but it’s healthy and could be used as anything from a pasta sauce to a topping for sauteed vegetables – maybe even a soup base (?)

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fry a fat pinch of minced ginger and garlic in oil for a few minutes

add prepared tomato sauce, a little lime juice, two pinches of five-spice powder (or blend your own with anise, fennel, pepper, clove, and cinnamon), and some gochujang (korean hot pepper paste – you can use homemade pepper paste, too!)

cook until flavors combine (only a few minutes)

perilla and vegetable jeon (gluten-free fried dumplings)

i’m starting to really get into korean food.

i went to a korean market yesterday and tasted a little leaf of everything i’d never heard of, like dropwort (parsley-like). nothing stood out as really unique, until i got stuck on these leaves labeled as “sesame leaves”. i love sesame, but these leaves had rounded stems and toothy leaves like the mint family. tasting it, it’s even more clear – like a cross between a bitter green, mint, and nettle. they also have the slightly fuzzy, sturdy feeling of catnip.

so what’s the deal with this sesame mint? turns out the literal “translation of deulkkae (“wild sesame”) and ggaennip (“sesame leaf”) are in spite of perilla’s not being closely related to sesame” (wiki). it’s incredibly good for you, like the other mints.

tried it in a salad – it’s a little too tough and bitter. tried marinating it in a berry vinegar. good, but it brought out a bitterness. so this will be the next thing i try! i think this sounds like a winner! the pictures look great – fried packets of meat. i’ll write a veg version, but can’t try it yet – i used up all my perilla leaves!

1 cup mixed vegetables, like carrots, onions, and whatever you have
15 Perilla Leaves
¼ Cup Flour (use a gluten-free blend if you like)
Eggs
1 Tbsp Soy Sauce
½ Tbsp Sesame Oil
⅛ tsp Black Pepper

Marinate hard vegetables in cooking wine, salt, and pepper. Cook some. Or don’t. I don’t know, I haven’t made this yet. Experiment! Definitely cook vegetables like eggplant prior to filling leaves.

Combine the vegetables, 1 egg, 1 Tbsp of soy sauce, ½ Tbsp of sesame oil, and ⅛ tsp of black pepper in a mixing bowl. Mix so that all of the ingredients stick together nicely.

Rinse about 15 medium sized perilla leaves and set them aside to dry out.

On a flat plate, pour about ¼ cup of flour. Evenly flour the backside of a perilla leaf. The flour helps the mixture stick to the perilla leaf.

Spread about 1 Tbsp of mixture on one half of the floured side of the perilla leaf. About a quarter inch thickness will be good.

Fold the perilla leaf in half and cover the outer surface with flour.

In a flat bowl, break 2 large eggs and whisk them gently. Mix in 2 pinches of salt. Dip both sides of the floured perilla leaf in the egg mixture.

Fry the egg-dipped perilla leaves in a heated and generously oiled pan. Fry each side of the jeon for about 7 to 8 minutes on medium or medium-low with patience. When one side is done, flip, and fry the other side for another 7 to 8 minutes.

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recipe from here

korean fried chicken and waffles (and a vegan, gf version!)

no junk food? check out the super-healthy vegan and gluten-free version!

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korean fried chicken and waffles

chunk three pounds of chicken.
coat in an egg and a teaspoon each salt and pepper, ½ cup potato starch powder, ¼ cup all-purpose flour, ¼ cup sweet rice flour, 1 ts baking soda, and 1 egg.
fry for ten minutes.
remove from oil and let strain a few minutes.
re-fry for ten minutes, or until crunchy and golden brown.

sauce:

fry 4 cloves of garlic in a little oil.
Add 1/3 cup tomato ketchup, 1/3 cup rice syrup (molasses mixed with maple syrup or honey can substitute), ¼ cup hot pepper paste, 1 tbs apple vinegar.
Simmer the mixture ~7 minutes. Keep heat low; burns easily.

top with sesame seeds and serve with waffles.

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super-healthy korean veggies and waffles

cook your favorite vegetables in homemade lacto-fermented kim chee (or garlic, ginger, hot pepper paste, and apple cider vinegar if you don’t have kim chee), and serve with waffles!

healthy waffles? sure!
make the waffles yourself with blends of protein-packed flours and lighter, easier to digest flours. i like half lighter flours and starches, like brown rice flour with a little potato starch or oat flour or coconut flour for sweetness, and half heavier flours, like some mixture of buckwheat, nut meal, and teff.

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first recipe from maangchi. idea for korean chicken and waffles comes from some restaurant.

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edit july 3 2012
(full menu: black sweet wild glutinous rice, sukha bateta nu shaak minus the cashews, a perilla walnut and berry vinaigrette marinated salad, popcorn chicken pieces, sichuan blistered long beans [long beans cut into 2in segments and fried on high heat with oil and chili sauce], and vegan korean sauce

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WOW! that chicken recipe is wonderful! it looks like something from a restaurant! DEFINITELY using it again! served the chicken with a gojuchang korean hot pepper sauce i made up, and it was awesome!!

gamjatang

this korean neckbone soup is fantastic!

Directions:

1. Soak 2.5 lb (about 1 kg) of pork neck bones in cold water for 2 hours.
porkbones
2. Boil water in a large pot.
3. Put ¼ of a medium sized napa cabbage (about 2-3 cups) into the boiling water and blanch it for a minute.
4. Rinse and drain the cabbage and put it in a bowl.
5. Tear each leaf lengthwise once or twice to make it bite size and set it aside.
6. Rinse pork neck bones in cold water and put them in boiling water with 4-5 slices of ginger (1 tbs). Cook for 7 minutes.
7. Rinse and strain the pork neck bones and put them in a large pot.
*tip: when you rinse the pork bones, pick out any excessive fat
8. Pour 10 cups of water into the pot.
9. Add 1 medium size sliced onion, 1 tbs of sliced ginger, 2 tbs of soy bean paste, 1 dried red chili pepper (after removing the seeds), and 2 dried shiitake mushrooms to the pot. Boil it for 1. 5 hours over medium high heat.
10. Prepare a small bowl to make the sauce! In the bowl, put 6-8 cloves of minced garlic, 2 tbs of hot pepper flakes, 1 tbs of hot pepper paste, 3 tbs of cooking wine, 3 tbs of fish sauce, 3 tbs of perilla seeds powder (deulkkae garu) and mix it all up.
11. Prepare a large bowl for vegetables
vegetables1
* Squeeze the cooked cabbage slightly to drain some of the water, and put it into the bowl.
* Cut about 10 perilla leaves into bite sized pieces and put them into the bowl.
perilla-leaves
* Cut 2 stalks of green onion and Asian chives (2-3 cups worth) into 7 cm long pieces and put them into the bowl.
* Rinse and drain 2 cups of soy bean sprouts and put them into the bowl.
* Peel 3 small potatoes and put them into the bowl.
Now you made the sauce and prepared all the vegetables. All you can do is to wait until the pork neck bone soup is finished cooking.
12. About 1 ½ hours later, take the red hot chilli pepper and shiitake mushrooms out of the pot.
13. Slice shiitake mushrooms into bite sized pieces.
14. Add your vegetables and your sauce and the chopped shiitake mushrooms into the soup. Cook for another 30 minutes.

(thanks maangchi!)

i didn’t like the chewiness of the meat, but it was worth it for a homemade beef stock that was so flavorful for so few ingredients! the sesame, garlic, and fish sauce are absolutely necessary. i subbed fresh mushrooms for the dry and skipped the perilla leaves, but followed pretty closely besides. lots of bang for your buck here (literally; cabbage and bean sprouts are as cheap as it gets!)

lacto-fermented squid (ojingeojeot)

go see this recipe, with its beautiful photos!

i know what you’re thinking. but i’m going to make it, and it’s going to be really, really good.

basically, you’ll want to carefully clean squid (or fish, or whatever,) and salt it heavily. same as fermenting vegetables! stick ’em in a jar. she recommends fermenting for a month in the fridge before adding green and red hot peppers, garlic, green onions, ginger, toasted sesame seeds, and a little sesame oil.

check out her recipe; i can’t do it justice describing it here.

the comments are glorious, too, including one from someone who found an intact 3″ fish inside her squid when she cleaned it!