Gamjatang (Korean Pork Bone Soup)

I thought it was almost spring season (well, at least according to the high street shops), but no, winter refuses to budge and it got really cold in London last weekend. What better than a warming bowl of slow-cooked broth, with that bit of spice and asian flavour to remind me of home? Gamjatang is a Korean spicy (adjustable) pork bone soup with fermented soybean paste, hot pepper flakes and lots of vegetables-- a one-pot meal, though Koreans will still have it with rice.

I adapted the recipe from Maangchi (the cutest cook on Youtube), because I'm guilty of seeking shortcuts (like not removing the chilli pepper and soaking the bones), and because I didn't have some of the ingredients. If you have, please use! Everyone on Maangchi's forums seem to love the flavour that perilla leaves added (like Japanese shiso but "better"), and perilla seeds (I used some sesame seeds because I just thought it would be nice, but it's not a replacement). I don't know if I'm missing out a lot, but even without those ingredients, the soup was sooo good and it made me feel warm and happy and Korean.

Gamjatang (Korean Pork Bone Soup)

serves 2-3

Ingredients

For soup base

1kg of pork (spine) bones

1 large onion, sliced

1" ginger, sliced into pieces

2 tbs soybean paste doenjang (like miso, but a stronger flavour, kind of like Chinese taucheo)

1 dried red chilli, seeds removed

3 dried shitake mushrooms

10 cups water

a bit more than 2l of water

For sauce

6 cloves of garlic, minced

2 tbsp of hot pepper flakes

1 tbsp Korean red chilli pepper powder (to replace the hot pepper paste)

3 tbsp Chinese cooking wine (shaoxing/huadiao)

3 tbsp fish sauce

1 tbsp of white sesame paste (to "replace" the 3tbsp of perilla seeds powder)

Vegtables

3 stalks of spring onions

1/4 Napa cabbage, chopped into bite-sized pieces.

1 big handful of beansprouts

3 small potatoes, peeled and halved

To serve

chopped spring onions

white pepper

(pretty black earthenware bowl if you have, which I don't)

Method

1. Blanch the pork bones in boiling water for 10 min, with half the ginger added. Drain and rinse the scum off.

2. Bring the pork bones and all the ingredients for the soup base to the boil in a large pot filled with about 2l water, then let it continue to simmer for 1.5h over medium high heat.

3. Add the sauce and vegetables to the pot and continue to cook for half an hour more.

4. Serve piping hot (á la all the Korean dramas hehe) with chopped spring onions and a dash of white pepper.

I love soups, and this one's just rich with flavour (and nutrients). As with all good bone broths, it gels the next day when cooled:

This is fun, I think I should start doing this "gelatin" test for all the bone broths I cook.

This is part of Pennywise Platter Thursday at the Nourishing Gourmet.

This is part of Fightback Fridays by Food Renegade.

Ginseng Chicken Soup

In Chinese cooking and TCM, herbs are the superfoods. Chinese herbs are very different from Western herbs. Chinese herbs can be really rare, made from the weirdest of ingredients like for e.g. cordyceps are made from caterpillar fungus, and the flavour they impart is often pungent and medicinal. But they really are medicinal in nature, and when combined right, are very healing (yet easy on the palate, unlike horrible pink cough syrups).

My mum is always sending me herbs (they always come dried), often pre-packed in lovely ziplocked bags with all the herbs in the right quantities, so I only need to throw them in with some meat on bone into the slow cooker and I come home to find dinner ready (made with mummy's love haha). I'm trying to learn about herbs, but it's not easy, because there are so many. This is the most popular soup of all, and there's even a very similar Korean version of it called Samgyetang. Ginseng is very prized, it's considered a cure-all for most ailments, and even for the healthy, are rejuvenating.

Ginseng Chicken Soup

Ingredients

serves 2 (you can easily double the recipe with an entire chicken to make a herbal chicken bone broth)

2 chicken thighs and drums (bone-on!)

2 pieces of dried Korean ginseng, with their "beards"

5 red jujube dates, pitted

2 tbsp of wolfberries

In TCM, they usually measure ingredients by weight, but this soup isn't exactly a medicine, so pardon my lack of specific grams.

Method

1. Bring all ingredients to a boil and let simmer on a very low heat for 3h, or put into a slow-cooker on low, for 6h or more.

It's winter now (very yin) hence you should use Korean or Chinese ginseng, because they're much stronger and very warming (yang). In summer, substitute with American ginseng. So you can have this the whole year round(: This is a really simple and clean soup so it really showcases the ginseng flavour. There are many other more complicated Chinese herbal soups like Eight Treasures Soup 八珍汤 or 六味汤, but my mum packs them for me ;)

Homemade Kimchi

Kimchi!! Sour, salty, sweet, spicy-- all in one! There's no doubt as to why it's such an important part of Korea's rich food culture. It makes the perfect side dish to rice dishes, to grilled meats, it's great in stews and in pancakes/omelettes, and it's also great for your health.

Methods for making kimchi vary, and in Korea they even have nationwide kimchi competitions! (I was watching some food documentary on my plane ride to Singapore last summer after I got bored of the movies.) Do check out Maangchi's kimchi recipe! Hers will probably taste better, because she takes the extra effort to make a kimchi "spice porridge" first before coating the cabbage. And she has add-ons like oysters. But oh well, my fuss-free method tastes not half bad too!

Homemade Kimchi

Ingredients

2 heads Chinese leaf lettuce/Napa cabbage, chopped into big pieces (or you can leave whole)

1/2 cup sea salt

2" piece of ginger, minced

2 cloves garlic, minced

1/2 onion, minced

1 tbsp fish sauce

2 tbsp sugar

5 tbsp Korean red chilli powder (it's more earthy and less spicy than normal chilli powder so you can add a lot to get that depth and nice red colour without burning your tongue)

1 tbsp hot pepper flakes (optional)

Choose your own "add-ons"

Spring onions, Leeks, Carrots, Radishes etc.

Method

1. Sprinkle the cabbage with the sea salt, and set aside for 2-4h, turning once in a while to salt evenly.

2. Rinse the lettuce 3 times. Drain.

3. Rub and evenly coat the cabbage with the rest of the ingredients.

4. Transfer to a tight sealed container, and leave it at room temperature for 2-4 days. You'll see bubbles!

5. Transfer to the fridge, for up to a month. It will get more sour and develop a stronger flavour. If you can wait, don't enjoy immediately. But I've left mine much longer, and Koreans prized long-fermented kimchi.

Home Cooking

When I first moved away from home, I didn't make or eat a lot of Korean food. I'd been eating it all my life, I still went back to my parents' place every couple of weeks so I didn't really feel the need to make it myself. However, the older I get the more I feel that changing. I still visit my parents quite often, but I find myself craving more and more of those home cooked meals from when I was a kid. I guess I've come to appreciate Korean cuisine a lot more (I was quite a picky eater as a child, so there were a lot of foods that I wouldn't eat) and now these dishes don't all fit into one weekend of meals. Either way, I've been trying to cook more of this myself at home and the best teacher for this is obviously my mom.

The problem with Korean food is that, unlike North American (or any other) cuisine, I can't just search for recipes online that seem to fit what I'm looking for. I need it to taste like what MOM made, so for that I need to go to the source. And since my mom (and I think this is the case with a lot of moms, or grandmothers that have been cooking for a long time) doesn't exactly write her recipes down, it's all about learning the techniques involved, or just how to eyeball the right amount of ingredients. For this reason I've started with the simplest recipes that a fairly small number of ingredients, to lessen the chance of messing up.

Hobak Jeon, or Korean Zucchini Pancakes, is one of the many popular street foods in Korea. There are only 5 ingredients involved and it's all about judging how much water to use - you want it to be fairly runny, not like a regular pancake batter at all (I'll admit - I DID try making these myself once previously using an online recipe. The pancakes were way too thick and puffy from not enough water in the batter) They don't taste anything like a North American pancake either - savoury and crispy, these are a tasty snack that is usually enjoyed with soy sauce.


Hobak Jeon (Korean Zucchini Pancakes)
1 zucchini
1 egg
1 cup flour
2 cups water
1 tsp salt
oil

1. Slice up zucchini into thin discs (the thinner the better!) and then slice the discs into thin strips. I admit, this takes awhile. You could probably use some sort of machine for this that I don't own.

2. Make the batter - Dump flour, salt and the egg into a medium sized bowl. Add 1 cup of water and stir. Continue adding water until you get a runny batter - how runny, it's hard to say. I can't think of a good comparison - like syrup? Or something like that. Add the zucchini and mix in.

3. Heat up your skillet or frying pan to medium heat with a good glug of canola oil. (My mom really emphasized that you should make sure you have enough oil to cover the pancake once you flip it as well) You don't want the heat to be too high or the pancakes will burn before cooking through the zucchini.

4. Using a ladle, pour in some batter. Make sure it's not too thick (the runniness will help with this). Cook for a couple of minutes, then flip over and continue cooking until both sides are browned and crispy. Cut into wedges and eat with soy sauce.

Korean Comfort Food

Last night I was home alone, cooking for one and didn't really feel like putting a lot of time into cooking a huge dinner. I wanted something quick and easy, but I'd also been craving some Korean food since I haven't been to my parents' place in a few weeks. Then I realized that I STILL hadn't gotten around to actually trying Sujaebi by myself at home. Perfect!

Growing up, comfort food didn't mean chicken pot pie, mac 'n' cheese or any of the other things that might immediately come to mind. It meant sujaebi, a ridiculously easy potato broth soup with hand-pulled dumplings. The broth makes it seem like a light dish but really it's full of starchy, salty dumplings and yummy potato chunks.

There are a number of variations of this dish, with different combinations of vegetables, kimchi, spicy sauce and seafood. But I didn't like any of those things as a kid, so my mom made my sujaebi with the most basic ingredients. And it's still the way I eat it. So simple but delicious.

Note: Though I tend to follow very specific recipes and instructions when I cook, the Korean dishes in my mental recipe file are the exception. My mom has never used a recipe as far as I know so I've also never tried to write them down. But even if I had, this dish is so easy that it really doesn't matter. The only thing is that the scale of the recipe can really vary. The measurements below make about two bowls of sujaebi.


Mom's Sujaebi

Dumpling dough
1 cup flour
salt
1 egg
oil
water

1. Measure out the flour into a small mixing bowl. Add some salt and a bit of oil (really you can use as little or as much as you want - I'm not really even sure what it's for).
2. Make a well and add the egg and some water. This is where the measurement is really sketchy. I usually just add a small amount and add as I stir...
3. Stir with a wooden spoon or your fingers until a sticky dough forms. Knead in the bowl for a couple of minutes, adding more water or flour as necessary until you have a fairly tacky but firm dough. Wrap with saran wrap and put in the fridge while you make the broth.

Sujaebi
Water
Salt
Anchovy Powder*
1/2 a Potato (I used Yukon Gold)

*I think you can find Anchovy powder at Asian supermarkets. To me, this is an essential ingredient that defines the flavour of the dish, but I'm sure you could use your own flavourings and spices to your preference

1. Put some water in a pot. I think I used about 3 cups. Salt and turn on the heat to high.
2. Cut up the potatoes into 1/4 inch-ish slices, cutting up the larger chunks into halves or quarters. It doesn't really matter as long as the slices are somewhat even. Add to the water in the pot.
3. Boil until potatoes are still just a bit firm, but starting to soften.
4. Add Sujaebi dumplings. This is probably the hardest part. I always had issues with pulling the dough, and it's only over time I've gotten better at creating the flat, thin dumplings that are ideal for Sujaebi.

• Take the dough ball out of the fridge - divide in half (it's usually easier to work with a smaller ball)
• Holding the ball in one hand, pull out a bit and flatten so it's pretty thin
• Pull the flattened bit off the ball, and use your other hand to stretch it out some more so that it's kind of like a thick potato chip in shape - drop into the boiling broth
• Repeat until both dough balls are in the broth

5. Give the Sujaebi a stir so that all the dumplings are wet. Add more salt and anchovy powder to taste. Continue lightly boiling for about 2 minutes, until the dumplings are cooked through.