Off to see Jorge in Korea!
Do you have a bucket list of things to do when traveling, if so, what’s yours? I’d love to know. Here’s ours when we travel:
FIRST DAY– a tour of the city on bikes. It’s a great way to get an overview of the city you are visiting and get a bit of exercise (guilt-free eating for the day, yay!) It does have it’s heartbeat quickening moments when you ride in traffic and every big city in the world has traffic. But we have biked in Rome, London, Boston, DC, Paris, and Seoul without mishap, just a couple of choice words from drivers. But hey, I get that here too.
SPORTS: We have watched rowing on the Thames, soccer in Italy, and now baseball in Korea and Japan. BOSS, so much fun and gives you a taste of the folks that live there.
EATS: Street food, hole-in-the-walls, local joints, my kinda food. Ok, occasionally, a meal that breaks the bank.
I push the envelope at times with my search for local food. I have waited in line for 90 minutes for Egg Tarts in Macau, meandered down small alleys looking for wonton soup in Hong Kong, or Okonomiyaki in Osaka. Unfortunately, the combination of spotty maps and my non-existent sense of direction means a lot of wandering around and spewing expletives at my phone when looking for those food gems. Good thing my family loves me, or at least I think they do.
HOME COOKING: Do you get tired of eating in restaurants? Miss your kitchen? Take a cooking class! We have made pasta and gelato in Florence and now homemade kimchi, seafood pancake-pajeon, and Bibimbap in Seoul.
Early morning at a local street market
Our cooking class with Joungy began with a visit to the market to buy ingredients, a Korean Veggie primer!
I watched this gentleman grind chili peppers into Gochugaru powder, absolutely mesmerizing.
We made Seafood Pancakes, or Pajeon, fresh kimchi, and my favorite bowl meal, Bibimbap. Compose your Bibimbap. Start with a pile of fluffy, warm rice, top with julienned carrots, cucumbers, squash, spinach, mushrooms, yesterday’s banchan, and seasoned beef or chicken. You get the picture; you can use anything you desire for toppings. For Joungy’s class, we had a wonderful array of veggies: carrots, cucumbers, daikon, shiitake mushrooms, shredded beef, and a chiffonade of Perilla leaves. Delicious!
The secret to her Bibimbap is the extra attention given to the sauce. Her Gochujang paste starts with combining corn syrup, a bit of soy sauce, and chopped garlic, then stir-frying it briefly. This elevates the sauce to a new level.
Mise En Place
Before cooking, prep all your ingredients. Julienne your carrots, shiitake mushrooms, blanch your spinach or bean sprouts and slice your cucumbers.
Season each component, then stir-fry each, and place on top of the rice in neat little separate piles-kid-friendly, lol. Top your masterpiece with a sprinkling of sesame seeds and a dollop of sauce. It’s colorful, delicious, and easy to prepare…what more could you ask for? If you can’t find Perilla leaves, garnish with chopped green onions.
A great primer for Bibimbap can be found in My Korean Kitchen, which has instructions to season the blanched bean sprouts and spinach.
Bibimbap 비빔밥 (Korean Mixed Rice)
Ingredients
Bibimbap (proportions for 1 bowl)
Beef:
- 1 clove garlic finely chopped
- 1/2 tsp brown sugar
- 1 tsp corn syrup
- 1/2 tsp salt
- 1 Tbsp soy sauce
- 1/2 tsp sesame oil
- 50 gm thinly sliced beef
Vegetables
- vegetable oil for frying, 1/2 T for each vegetable
- 2 fresh shiitake mushroomes, thinly sliced
- 1/2 carrot, julienned 1/4 cup
- 1/4 cup daikon, julienned or bean sprouts
- 1/8 tsp pepper powder Gochugaru
- 1 handful spinach leaves or sub 1/4 cup thinly sliced zuchinni or Persian cucumber
- 2 cups Cooked white rice I use a rice cooker, its your call how to cook the rice!
Ingredients for Sauce:
- 5 T Gochujang chili paste
- 2 T Corn syrup light
- 3 cloves garlic
- 1 T brown sugar
- 1/2 T vegetable oil
Garnish
- 1 egg, fried sunnyside up p per serving (optional)
- 5 perilla leaves aka sesame leaves can sub shiso leaves, julienned
- diced green onions sprinkled on top to finish
- Toasted sesame seeds sprinkled on top to finish
Instructions
For Sauce
- In a nonstick skillet, add oil and chopped garlic. Turn heat onto medium high. Saute until garlic is brown color, don't burn!
- Add remaining ingredients for sauce and stir over medium low heat for approximately 5 minutes. Set aside.
For Vegetables and Rice
- Cooked medium grain white rice
- In a small bowl combine soy sauce, brown sugar, corn syrup, pepper powder and chopped garlic. Add beef and stir to combine.
- Stir fry each vegetable-mushroom, carrot, daikon, separately until tender crisp. Season with salt to taste. Place each vegetable on a platter, keep separate. Stir fry mushrooms in 1/2 T sesame oil, remaining vegetables can be saute in 1/2 T vegetable oil or a blend of sesame oil and vegetable oil
- If using bean sprouts or spinach, blanch in hot water until tender crisp about 1 minute
- Stir fry beef until cooked through.
Building Your Bowl
- Divide hot rice between 3-4 bowls
- Place vegetables in bundles around the bowl in a radial pattern. Place beef in the center.
- Garnish with sesame seeds and perilla leaves and approximately 1 T sauce for each bowl. Place extra sauce in a bowl and serve along side bowls.
- Optional (mandatory for me): Fry an egg for each serving, sunnyside up, and place on top of beef
Notes
So good! Bowled over by Bi Bim Bap!