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Culinary exercise number one
Aug. 24th, 2007 07:50 pmHaste Street, on the Feast of St. Bartholomew
Today I made kimchi jjigae (stew with kimchi) for dinner. It's probably the easiest Korean dish to make that still counts as cooking, i.e. something even unmarried eldest sons know how to cook. (Instant ramen doesn't count as cooking, even if you do add in fresh ingredients.) Still, we must all start somewhere, right?
The following isn't precisely a recipe, but I wanted to make notes for future reference. I've made kimchi jjigae before of course, but the only way I'm going to get interested in cooking is to blog about it, so I might as well start with the basics.
- Heat up the pot and put in a can of white tuna. If you go to a Korean grocery market, you can usually find specially prepared tuna intended for this kind of stew. It comes with some seasoning and contains some oil, which adds flavor to the stew. But the can I had on hand for today was just a normal Bumblebee can.
- Add some finely chopped garlic (half a clove, maybe?) and enough kimchi for the amount of stew you want to cook. It took me a while to get the hang of judging my portion size. Usually for stew, I try not to fill the small pot past the halfway point. The best type of kimchi to use is the most common one made from Chinese cabbage. Kimchi made from radish or cucumbers are generally not used in this sort of stew. Try to put in the leafy portions, not the fleshy white portions.
- Sauté in the pot for a few minutes until everything is well-mixed. Add some of the "brine" from the kimchi pot. This helps "thicken" the flavor of the stew. Add a little water. Not adding too much water is crucial. I think the best way is to think of it as just enough to cover all the solid food in the pot.
- Cover the pot and let it boil. Then add bean sprouts and tofu. For stews, I usually slice tofu into small rectangles rather than dicing it into cubes, like I do for soups. I have no idea why the difference in shape matters but that's the way my mother does it.
- Simmer until bean sprouts are done. (This step doesn't take long.) Then add a few drops of sesame oil and serve with rice. (Koreans almost always mix stews into their rice.)
- A common variation is to start off with pork instead. In this case, cook with kimchi and garlic until the meat is browned before putting any liquid in. Stews made with meat usually taste better but meat is more expensive and also kind of annoying to chop up.
- Another possibility is to add frozen shrimp or shellfish in addition to the tuna, but adding seafood tends to "thin" the flavor a little, so it's essential not to use too much water.
- Other vegetables can be added too, although I like to keep kimchi jjigae simple since there's already a mix of vegetables in the kimchi itself. What I do like to add (and forgot to do today) was potatoes (sliced in thick semicircles). When using potatoes, the stew needs to simmer longer until the potatoes are fully cooked.
Yours &c.
Today I made kimchi jjigae (stew with kimchi) for dinner. It's probably the easiest Korean dish to make that still counts as cooking, i.e. something even unmarried eldest sons know how to cook. (Instant ramen doesn't count as cooking, even if you do add in fresh ingredients.) Still, we must all start somewhere, right?
The following isn't precisely a recipe, but I wanted to make notes for future reference. I've made kimchi jjigae before of course, but the only way I'm going to get interested in cooking is to blog about it, so I might as well start with the basics.
- Heat up the pot and put in a can of white tuna. If you go to a Korean grocery market, you can usually find specially prepared tuna intended for this kind of stew. It comes with some seasoning and contains some oil, which adds flavor to the stew. But the can I had on hand for today was just a normal Bumblebee can.
- Add some finely chopped garlic (half a clove, maybe?) and enough kimchi for the amount of stew you want to cook. It took me a while to get the hang of judging my portion size. Usually for stew, I try not to fill the small pot past the halfway point. The best type of kimchi to use is the most common one made from Chinese cabbage. Kimchi made from radish or cucumbers are generally not used in this sort of stew. Try to put in the leafy portions, not the fleshy white portions.
- Sauté in the pot for a few minutes until everything is well-mixed. Add some of the "brine" from the kimchi pot. This helps "thicken" the flavor of the stew. Add a little water. Not adding too much water is crucial. I think the best way is to think of it as just enough to cover all the solid food in the pot.
- Cover the pot and let it boil. Then add bean sprouts and tofu. For stews, I usually slice tofu into small rectangles rather than dicing it into cubes, like I do for soups. I have no idea why the difference in shape matters but that's the way my mother does it.
- Simmer until bean sprouts are done. (This step doesn't take long.) Then add a few drops of sesame oil and serve with rice. (Koreans almost always mix stews into their rice.)
- A common variation is to start off with pork instead. In this case, cook with kimchi and garlic until the meat is browned before putting any liquid in. Stews made with meat usually taste better but meat is more expensive and also kind of annoying to chop up.
- Another possibility is to add frozen shrimp or shellfish in addition to the tuna, but adding seafood tends to "thin" the flavor a little, so it's essential not to use too much water.
- Other vegetables can be added too, although I like to keep kimchi jjigae simple since there's already a mix of vegetables in the kimchi itself. What I do like to add (and forgot to do today) was potatoes (sliced in thick semicircles). When using potatoes, the stew needs to simmer longer until the potatoes are fully cooked.
Yours &c.
