OOriYOri

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 made dumpling(mandu) stew for dinner, since it was cold and it was yummy. This particular dumpling doesn’t use meat so this dish can be converted to a vegetarian dish if you substitute beef stock to vegetable stock.

1. Make beef stock.

To make this beef stock you will need one (1) pound of Beef brisket, one (1) whole onion, three (3) stalks of green onion, four (4) cloves of garlic, a small piece (size of your thumb) of ginger, and one(1) table spoon of whole pepper.  Add them all together in a big pot with about 3 quarts of water. Bring it to boil without the cover until the meat looks half way cooked, then cover the pot and simmer for about 2 hours. Not peeling the onion helps the broth to taste a little less meaty.

After stock has been simmering for 2 hours, strain the stock and just save the liquid and the beef. When beef cools down, rip the beef into bite size pieces.

2. While stock is simmering make the dumplings.

This dumpling uses same portion of green onions, kimchi, tofu (firm kind), and bean sprout.

First you will need to boil some water and blanch bean sprout for about 2 minutes. Cool it down when you take them out and squeeze the water out so dumpling stuffing isn’t watery.

Then dice green onion, squeezed kimchi and bean sprout. Also squeeze the firm tofu to get rid of water.

Then in a big mixing bowl add pepper, sesame seed oil, chili flakes, brown sugar, soy sauce, garlic, and corn starch and mix them all together. (Amount of spices would depend on how much dumpling you are making.)

Make the dumpling like the picture.

3. Chop up any types of green onions, and any type of mushrooms and peppers you prefer. Here we used enoke, shitake mushrooms and green and red serrano peppers we grew in our garden. (serrano peppers are super hot so if you are not a fan of spicy food, you can leave the pepper out)

4. Assemble all ingredients (dumpling, stock, mushrooms, beef, green onion, peppers) together in a pot and cook them all together. Dumplings at the bottom of the pan, add the stock, then mushrooms, beef, green onions, and peppers on top. Season the soup with soy sauce to taste.

When dumplings are all cooked, they are ready!

5. Mani deuseyo!!