OOriYOri

This is my husband’s favorite snack. Usually in Korea people eat this as a side dish and it was one of my favorite lunch menu, but at our house whenever we make it we eat it while we prepare for dinner. If you are planning to eat this as a snack, I would make it a little less salty.

This dish takes about 5 minutes to make and only need a package of fishcakes (I have the square sheet kind here, but you can use any type of fishcake you get at the market), couple stalks of green onions, soy sauce, corn syrup(moolyoht) or oligosaccharide(oligodang) which you can get at the Korean market, minced garlic, sesame oil, pepper and sesame seeds.

First boil a pot of water. While you are boiling the water, cut up the fishcakes to the size and shape of your choice.

Leave the cut up fishcakes in a bowl then clean three (3) stalks of green onions.Then get a large pan and heat it up with some olive oil.  Here I am using a wok.

While pan is heating up, dice the green onions.

By now, your pan will be hot and ready to go. Reduce the heat to medium so your food doesn’t burn. Add Green onions, tablespoon of soysauce and a table spoon of corn syrup to your pan.

In the meantime, get your boiling water and pour it to your fishcakes and drain the water. Fishcakes are fried so by doing this step, you can eliminate some of the oil and also cleans it at the same time. Once drained, add the fishcake with a tablespoon of minced garlic to the pan and cook it for about 2-3 minutes. When it’s almost done add a pinch of  black pepper.

When you feel your fishcake is hot and soft, and all the ingredients are cooked, add a couple teaspoons of sesame oil and transfer your fishcake to your serving dish. Once it’s on the dish sprinkle it with some sesame seeds.

mani deuseyo!!

It’s still raining in Los Angeles. There was even hail, which freaked out my husband enough that he had to go out and cover the car. Anyway, when it is raining outside we Koreans think of Jeun also called “boochimgae”, which translates as pancakes or frittatas.

You can make different kind of Jeun using all sorts of vegetables and meats. Today we made Kimchi jeun, which uses Kimchi as the main ingredient.

To make this you will need three (3) cups of chopped kimchi, one (1) cup of chopped mixed seafood(optional), half (1/2) cup of meat (here we used beef, my mom doesn’t eat chicken or pork so we kind of only have beef at home. Again, this is also optional), two(2) cups of korean pancake mix (you can buy this at Korean market. If you don’t have it at home, you can substitute this with two (2) cups flour and one egg), one cup and a half (1 1/2) cup water, pepper, olive oil (or any kind of cooking oil).

My favorite kind of Kimchi is from Galleria brand kimchi. Galleria market is located at Western and Olympic in Los Angeles Koreatown.

Using my probably not so green but handy plastic glove, take the kimchi out from the jar and chop them into quarter inch squares. (A little larger is ok, but you don’t want them to be bigger than 1/2 an inch)

Rinse seafood mix and chop them so they are slightly smaller than your chopped up kimchi. You can get the seafood mix in the frozen food section at any korean market.

Also chop up the beef to seafood mix size. You can even use ground beef.

In a bowl mix kimchi, seafood mix, and beef after you add in the korean pancake mix, little bit of black pepper and water. If you decide to get the korean pancake mix, it is called buchimgaru it’s usually next to flour, breadcrumbs and tempura batters. Because pancake mix is like “just add water” pancake mix, if you don’t have them you can use flour and eggs instead.

Heat up a pan with a bit of oil. You don’t want to be too stingy on the oil since you have to pan fry the pancake mixture. I used olive oil, but you can use regular frying oil. (just don’t use butter since it will burn) If you like, you can use non stick pan, but I am using my trusty cast iron skillet which I use to cook virtually everything…

Start the pan on high heat. Once the pan is hot scoop the pancake mixture to the pan and reduce the heat to medium strength. Depending on your stove you might have to raise the heat a little. Since pancake takes a while to cook, you want the heat to be low enough not to burn them but high enough to fry the pancake.

You can make a big one and cut them up like the way they do it at restaurants, or you can even make them small so it is easier to share. It usually takes me 10 to 12 minutes to cook, because i like them a little crispy on the edges.

Try not to flip them too often. They might break. When they are all cooked enjoy them by the rainy window!

mani deuseyo!

It’s been cold and raining cats and dogs in Los Angeles so I have been in the mood for soup. Spicy Beef Soup is one of my favorite Korean soups, and since everyone in our family likes it we decided to make it. There are several ways to make this soup and some version requires you to cook it for almost a day, but this version it takes about hour and a half so if you are in the mood for this soup and don’t have all day to prepare for it then use this recipe.

If you have some left over, it is yummy to make this with some rice cake and dumplings for next day lunch! Just boil the soup first, add dumplings and rice cake and voila! you got an awesome lunch.

In order to make this soup, you will need one (1) cup of  dried Gosari (dried fern brake), one (1) pound of beef brisket, five to seven (5-7) stalks of green onions, 2 tablespoons of ground up chili peppers, one (1) tablespoon of minced garlic, half (1/2) teaspoon of minced ginger, two (2) tablespoons of soy sauce, salt, black pepper, and half (1/2) tablespoon of sesame seed oil.

To make the soup, First you need to soak gosari in water. Gosari is fernbrake in English and it looks like this at the market. You can find them in the dried vegetable section.

Soak one (1) cup of dried gosari in water overnight. (it’s better to soak it over night because they are pretty tough)

Soak the beef brisket in cold water for about an hour to get rid of blood in the meat. (I change the water about 2-3 times during the hour)

When this is all done, bring ten (10) cups of water to boil in a big pot. Once the water starts to boil drop the meat into the boiling water and cook it for about forty (40) minutes with the pot lid open. During this time periodically skim off the top of the broth to get rid of whatever floats to the top – such as fat.

While the meat is cooking boil gosari in a separate pot for about 15 minutes then drain the gosari and leave it on the side. (You can do this in advance and boil it twice to get rid of the bitter taste.)

In a separate bowl, combine 2 tablespoons of ground up chili peppers, one (1) tablespoon of minced garlic, half (1/2) teaspoon of minced ginger, two (2) tablespoons of soy sauce, salt, black pepper, and half (1/2) tablespoon of sesame oil and leave it on the side.

In a separate bowl, get four (4) cups of water then add and dissolve one (1) tablespoon of salt. Take the meat out from the boiling water and put it in the salt water. Since the water is cold, you will be able to shred the beef without burning your fingers.

Once the beef has been shredded, add the meat with the salt water into the boiling beef broth and boil it for 20 minutes.

Take the meat out of the broth in to a bowl, add the gosari and the spice mixture/paste and mix them all together.

Cut 5-7 stalks of green onions into 4 inch pieces .

Add beef mix and green onions in the broth and cook it for another 20 minutes.

Now it is ready to be devoured!

Mani deuseyo!!

I know it looks complicated, but compared to the other way of making this soup which takes over 8 hours, this is a simplified easy version I will post the long version when we make it again soon.

We pack lunch for work and when we are out of sandwich meat we make egg salad the night before so we can make a quick sandwich in the morning.

The following recipe makes three (3) sandwiches.

You will need, six (6) slices of bread (i like the white/wheat square bread for this), six (6) eggs, one (1) cup of ham of any type of salty meat (i love spam), two thirds (2/3) cup of carrots for crunch and color, a half (1/2) cup of bell peppers (here I used a quarter (1/4) cup of green onions and a quarter (1/4) cup of serrano peppers since I was out of bell peppers – again this is for crunch and color), a third (1/3) cup of diced and squeezed pickle. You will also need three (3) tablespoon of mayonnaise, one (1) tablespoon of dijon mustard (or any other type of mustard you like), a little it of pepper and maybe salt if want more salt (I usually don’t need to put more salt because I am happy with the saltiness that comes from the ham).

1. Boil six (6) eggs and peel them. Put eggs and cold water on the stove bring it to boil, and when it starts to boil set your timer for 15 more minutes. You will have perfect hard boiled eggs every time! When eggs are done immediately drop them in cold water – this makes it easier to peel them.

Once the eggs are peeled you want to dice them. I use this Egg Slicer and it makes dicing the eggs a snap.

2. Chop Carrots, Bell peppers (here green onions and serrano peppers), ham, and pickle. After you dice them all, you will need to squeeze the pickle in a cheese cloth to squeeze out the juice.

3. Once all your ingredients are chopped up and ready, add them all in a big bowl. Then you will add 3 tablespoons of mayo, 1 tablespoon of dijon, add some pepper then mix. You got yourself an awesome egg salad! You can eat them just the way it is if you prefer, but what I like to do is to put them overnight in the fridge then make a sandwich for lunch for next day.

I cut them in triangle pieces for this picture, but for lunch, I just cut it in half and put them in a sandwich container and they are ready to go!

Mani deuseyo!!