Trying out new recipes

Last Friday I decided that I would spend the afternoon cooking some new-to-me Korean dishes. The idea was to cook enough to last over the weekend and into this week.

The first dish was an oxtail soup. The version I was trying to make is the milky version. The bones are cooked for many hours and 'should' result in a broth that is milky in colour. Mine didn't turn out milky at all. I think I need to adapt my recipe in a couple of ways

1. Soak the meat to draw out as much blood as possible

2. Allow the tail meat to stay in the pot for a longer amount of time

3. Research more...

I made 2 big bowls worth of broth. Having already finished the first bowl over the past few days, tonight I used broth from the second bowl. It appears to be more strong in flavour than the first bowl and it was phenomenal with some pork and shrimp wontons in it. I should have taken a photo of it, but I'll have it again tomorrow and will try to take one then.

Another dish was stir-fried fish cakes with veggies. Fish cakes come in many shapes and sizes. I ended up with thin sheets of fish cakes. I thought I was buying slightly thicker ones, but these worked well too.

It uses fish cakes, bell pepper, oyster sauce, peanut oil, black and white sesame seeds, carrots, onion and garlic.

The veggies were chopped and fried in a little bit of peanut oil

The fish cakes were sliced and then added to the veggies

Add oyster sauce and sesame seeds et voila!

Next was a cucumber salad. This would have been prettier had I used Asian cucumber, coarse pepper flakes and a wavy vegetable slicer. Ingredients: cucumber, shallot, garlic, red pepper powder, black sesame seeds and rice vinegar

Slice, dice and mix

Not the prettiest dish I've ever made, will try again with the aforementioned changes.

Then it was on to an acorn jelly dish.

Soy sauce, honey, sesame oil, red pepper powder, scallion and garlic were combined in a bowl.

Acorn jelly was sliced (a wavy cutter would have made this prettier too!)

Lettuce, cucumber, onion and carrots were mixed in a bowl. The sliced jelly and sauce were then added.

 It resulted in a nutty dish. Again, not very pretty. I think using a different type of lettuce would be better.

I served these banchan to accompany our soybean soup and rice. I had also bought some Korean pancakes from the supermarket incase any of my dishes turned out to be inedible!

I love this soup!!!!

While I was shopping at H-mart, the local Korean supermarket, I picked up this jug. I like that it is glass, pink and has nice sayings on it. I use it to make my corn tea, a good digestive.

The next day I made a chicken dish using chicken wings, red pepper paste, red pepper powder, soy sauce, sugar, potatoes, onion, garlic, chili pepper and scallions.

The pepper powder, paste, soy sauce, sugar and minced garlic were mixed in a bowl.

In a dutch over the chicken, sauce, 2 cups of water and chopped onion were brought to a boil and allowed to cook, covered, for 20 minutes before adding the peeled and cubed potatoes. Another 20 minutes boiling with the lid on before allowing 5 minutes with the lid off to reduce the sauce.

This was Matt's favourite dish. A great sauce, something we're going to try on the grill when the weather is better!

Soup for the Soul

Today's Jjigae is quite similar to yesterday's but at the same time it is altogether different! Yesterday we had predominate flavours coming from the red pepper paste and the kimchi.

Today's jjigae uses less kimchi and instead of red pepper paste we use Soybean paste and clams.

You will need:

Tofu

Soybean paste

Zucchini (courgette)

Onion

Beech mushrooms

Enoki mushrooms

Kimchi

Clams (I used thawed fully cooked clams meat)

Spring onion

A pinch of red pepper powder.

Don't I have the cutest kitchen helper in the world!!!

Blend a tsp of soybean paste in a little hot water. Add your chopped zucchini, onion, beech mushrooms, red pepper powder and whole clams to the pot. Fill the pot up with some cold water and bring everything to a boil.

When it's boiling away add the sliced tofu and chopped kimchi...

Allow it to boil for a couple of minutes and then add the enoki mushrooms and finely sliced green onion...

I served the soup with plain rice and toasted seaweed lava...

You can use a spoonfull of rice to absorb some of the broth or you can add it to a sheet of the lava and make a mini rice roll. Yummza!

Gettin' Jjigae With It

Tonight for dinner I made a super easy Kimchi Jjigae. Jjigae is a Korean soup/stew of which there are many varieties!

To make this yummy soup you will need:
Tofu
Zucchini (courgette)
Onion
Enoki mushrooms
Kimchi (the smellier the better!)
Gochujang (red pepper paste)
and a pinch of red pepper powder

I use a single serving size pottery style pot to make this soup, I think it does a great job of intensifying flavours and getting the soup super hot. You could always follow this recipe in a saucepan, which in addition is a less messy way to do it. My bowl is placed on the gas stove top and when it boils it sends liquid everywhere.

Dissolve the red pepper paste into a couple tablespoons of hot water in your soup pot. Add the chopped zucchini, onion and red pepper powder. Add more water and bring to a boil

When it starts to boil add the sliced tofu and chopped kimchi (get some kimchi juice in it too Mmmmm)

Here you can see my bowl on the stove top and why it can get rather messy!

Let it boil for a couple of minutes and then add the enoki mushrooms on the top for the last minute. I would normally add thinly sliced scallions at this stage too, but I was out of them today. Now is also the time to add a small drop of sesame oil, right before serving.

I served my soup with a bowl of rice and my little fishies (you can find my recipe for the fish here)

Super quick, easy and healthy!

Back to cooking...

...
After a very strange past 6 months I'm back to my cooking :)

I'm obviously not in China, but back in the US. But let's not dwell on the past, let us instead see how to make a super easy and scrumptious Korean meal called Sundae Bokkeum (순대볶음) or as Matt called it "Sunday Bottom".

It is a sweet potato noodle dish that contains carrots, cabbage and Korean blood sausage (the sausage is the Sundae). Bokkeum refers to the fact that it is stir-fried. From start to finish it took about 20 minutes to make.

You will need:
- 1/4 head of cabbage, chopped 
- 3 carrots, peeled & sliced
- a handful of dried sweet potato vermicelli noodles
- 1 tbsp Korean red pepper paste
- 1 tsp Korean red pepper powder
- 3 tbsp lite soy sauce
- 1 1/2 tsp sugar
- 1/2 cup water
- 2 Korean blood sausages

The sausages I bought were frozen and already fully cooked and so it was just a matter of reheating them. They came in vacum sealed bags. They were boiled in the bag for 10 minutes and then left to sit in the hot water for a further 5 minutes. Check out how dirty my stove top is!! My stove stop is always dirty as I'm such a messy cook.

In a little peanut oil stir fry the carrots and cabbage. At this time also boil the sweet potato noodles for 6 minutes.

Mix the red pepper paste, red pepper powder, soy sauce, sugar and water together to make a sauce. Add the sauce and sliced sausage to the vegetables. Allow to cook over a medium heat for a few minutes.

When the noodles are ready add them to the wok, mix well and then serve.

It was a super delicious meal! The sausage is very similar to black pudding, but the texture was a little softer, maybe due to how it was prepared. I think that if the sausage were thawed and then pan fried it would take on the same texture as black pudding.

There is a popular soup Sundaeguk (순대국) made with this sausage that also contains intestines. I've never cooked with intestine before, so I think I shall have to do some research before I attempt that dish.