Korean Food

[Stokey Sue Profile]

some pig's liver I salted ... in a Tupperware box in the bottom of the fridge

I think the simplest solution is to get a new fridge - the "recycling" option ensures they'll take the old one away no questions asked...

In a clearout a while back I discovered TWO blocks of balachan in different dark recesses. Must check them out...

Douglas Adams fans will remember that removing the fridge didn't work terribly well for Dirk Gently ..... it became the symbol of guilt

My balachan is a sticky mass in one of those little plastic jars, looks like mascara, doesn't smell like it, suspect the block might be easier to handle

[Badger's Mate Profile]

suspect the block might be easier to handle

Depends how angry it is.

Careful with the eye make-up...

[Pampy Profile]

Just seen this in the May BBC Good Food magazine - to make a substitute for gochujang, mix 2 parts miso paste to one part sriracha sauce.

[Stokey Sue Profile]

I suppose it might work as long as you used a pale miso, not a dark one, but it doesn't sound quite right somehow

Do they give a sub for the flakes, gochugara? I suspect my Aleppo pepper was not quite hot enough

[Pampy Profile]

No - the only sub. suggestion was for the gochujang.

[Stokey Sue Profile]

Well today I had lunch at Bibimbap on Greek Street, one of Time Out's ten best budget meals in central London
It came in a traditional hot stone bowl, filled from bottom up with rice, shredded veg and bean sprouts, then topped with beef bulgogi (marinated and stir fried beef strips)
No sauce or dressing on the veg, and I don't know what the beef had been marinated in but it had left no trace of flavour, though some effect on the texture
As advertised, the crispy rice crust that stuck to the hot bowl was nice, the rest was as dull as I've made it sound, not awful but no idea why it is so fashionable, just uninteresting IMHO. I ate quite a lot of red sauce (runny gochujang) and yellow sauce (looked like hot dog mustard, tasted like light miso thinned with mirin, nice)
Should probably have asked for kimchi (neither supplied nor offered, may have been hidden in the menu)

The caff is pleasant enough, five star loos

So went on to Centre Point Food Store, on New Oxford St next to Centre Point. The ground floor is a crammed Korean food store. Didn't buy anything, I did find a jar of gochugaru chilli flakes, but it was quite big (the size of a 200 g instant coffee jar), £4.99, and it looked like Aleppo pepper (intensely red small flakes), and the label said only a shade over 5 000 Scoville units, so basically similar to Aleppo pepper (Turkish pul biber, cheap as chips)

The shop does have a lot of stock, so if you know what you want, pretty good, the basement cafe looks interesting.
So a half successful Korean day

[Sakkarin Profile]

the rest was as dull as I've made it sound

:-(

[Stokey Sue Profile]

I'm going to try elsewhere, Judy Joo's version looks tasty

http://www.foodnetwork.co.uk/recipes/biggest-and-best-bibimbap.html

[jeral Profile]

That Judy Joo one looks a lot more exciting than the dull bowl you described. From her programmes, receipes are all very quick-cook and easy too, if you have all the ingredients, and measure them out first. Fingers crossed - let us know.

[Sakkarin Profile]

Trip to Morrisons today as I fancied a cycle in the sunshine, and I double checked beforehand to see if they stock Gochujang. Apparently yes, but it was nowhere to be seen. No problem, they've always had it at Tesco for several years now, so I stopped off there on my way back. Not any more, it's disappeared off the shelves. No way am I going to substitute miso paste and srirachi, so it's a non-Korean diet until I find some gochujang!

I see Sainos purport to stock it, I need to replenish my stock of cheap and cheerful french lager from there, so maybe that's my next trip.

Maybe Tesco make more money from selling Gochujang via this Bibimbap kit, with Gochujang "style" paste. I see it says you need 11 other ingredients to prepare it, not really much of a kit, if you need a whole bagful of shopping to finish it off.

https://www.tesco.com/groceries/product ... =289492008

[Stokey Sue Profile]

One obvious problem with the ingredient,
1. Specifies long grain rice, Judy J says round
2. If it's a kit, not just a seasoning mix, why isn't the rice in it?

Hmmm...

[Sakkarin Profile]

No Gochujang in Sainos either. There's an Asda opposite Sainos so I went there too, and they did not have it in the familiar rectangular pack, but they had "Gochujang Sauce" in a tiny bottle for £3. As it was sauce rather than paste I assumed it was something watered down, and was not prepared to pay that for a tiny jar. I got home and looked it up, and it is actually less of a sub than the miso/srirachi one, as there is no soy in it of any description (see link below). No short grain rice in either shop, either

https://groceries.asda.com/product/cook ... 0002283051

Madhur Jaffrey's "Far Eastern Cookery" has a section on Korean recipes, and perchance also has a Gochujang (although called Kochu chang and Kochojang there) substitute, as follows:

4 tbs miso, 1.5 tbs paprika, 1 tsp chilli powder, 1 tbs sugar

Just compared the Bibimbap recipe in my Korean cookbook with the JJ one, and there's not a great deal of agreement although same ballpark. My recipe uses shredded thin strips of beef and fried quails eggs. Mind you virtually all recipes where there are loads of ingredients disagree with each other, that's why I used to make those huge spreadsheets to work out where they actually agreed!

[Sakkarin Profile]

Gochujang at my local strange little chinese supermarket, third shelf up on the left, three different brands, and elsewhere they had a half-sized box of the red brand, 200g for £1.50, which I got. Also got some fresh kimchi, but couldn't find specifically korean chilli. Should have asked, and also should have checked out the rice, as a second visit to Tesco confirms they have no ordinary short grain, so I bought sushi rice. Only three times as expensive as my usual top quality extra long basmati

Bibimbap predicted for tonight.

http://www.lifanstore.com/about-us.php

[Sakkarin Profile]

Bibimbap
Jeez, that was complicated. Made my Bibimbap, looks like a bit of a kitchen sink of ingredients, but my how it works! One of the best things I've eaten. Seriously. I used the recipe in my book, but added some kimchi from Stokey's recipe.

Clockwise from the fried egg: fried seasoned mooli strips, fried seasoned courgette strips, fried seasoned carrot strips, fried seasoned beansprouts, fried seasoned shitake slivers (from dried), fried seasoned (heavily) beef slivers, sliced kimchi, sliced cucumber, all on a bed of steamed sushi rice. Garnished with toasted sesame seeds and seaweed strips and lashings of gochujang chilli sauce (gochujang paste, honey and sesame oil).

I put "seasoned" each time because in my recipe each of the seasonings is slightly different, so you can't fry them all together. I said it was complicated...

But "whoar". How come I missed this when I dabbled with Korean before?

An almighty pile of washing up to do now.

[Stokey Sue Profile]

That looks excellent Sakkarin, did you say which recipe that was because I can't see it?

Some of the Korean American blogs I looked at mentioned making bibimbap by using up leftovers of Korean side dishes of seasoned veg, which would cut down the effort quite a bit, and presumably the would all be different

[Sakkarin Profile]

My book is The Food & Cooking of Korea by Young Jin Song. It says "previously published as "Korean Cooking", so I guess it is the second one down on this Amazon page. It is a hefty book weighing in at 256 pages, if that "Japan and Korea" book has absorbed it, then that must be an even heftier volume.

https://www.amazon.co.uk/s/ref=nb_sb_no ... g+Jin+Song

The recipe uses fried quails eggs, but I looked at all the online images and went for a fried egg rather than a quail one (or raw yolk). This recipe used slivered beef, a couple of the piccies clearly use raw beef. (EDIT: Click the "dolset bibimbap" link at the top for the raw ones)

Crossover moment, as I have always said I don't like kimchi, but this time I am warming to it, and have even been nibbling bits straight out of the pack/tin ( I had a small tin as well as the new fresh pack and opened both to compare).

P.S. A missed opportunity to spiralise? My julienning was extremely lazy.

[Sakkarin Profile]

Bulgogi
Plenty of beef left, so Bulgogi for me today! Basically grilled marinated very thin strips of beef.

Served on a bed of similar veg to the Bibimbap, using the same marinade as the bibimbap veg, and a bit of leftover kimchi round the edge. I used extra long basmati, as to be honest I preferred it to the sushi rice, which ended up a bit too moist for me.

Another "Whoar".

I made more Bibimbap yesterday, and fried all the veg in one using all the marinade ingredients, rather than separating them out, it was fine. However I forgot the seaweed strips, and considering the dish as a whole, I think they really do add an extra note which was missing. Doesn't mean I didn't enjoy it though.

Incidentally I disagree with my previous comment about the substitutes for gochujang - it is neithar as hot or as complex as I remember, so I feel that miso and srirachi WOULD be a suitable replacement.

[Luca Profile]

That looks very tasty. I still haven't made it to the Korean supermarket yet but will do soon I hope.

This burger recipe might be of interest. I haven't tried it yet. There's a link to another Korean recipe at the bottom or thereabouts (braised Korean beef).

http://eatlikeagirl.com/gojuchang-and-p ... more-43616

[Sakkarin Profile]

She is as in love with Gochujang as I am with Chilli Bean Paste!

Incidentally the Bimbap recip I followed that I said was a faff because each vegetable required individula frying with slightly different seasonings - I had another look through my book, and each of the six individual veg has a recipe page of its own, so in effect in the one dish I made seven different Korean dishes. Also gives an idea as to why the book is so fat!

[Luca Profile]

She is as in love with Gochujang as I am with Chilli Bean Paste!

Incidentally the Bimbap recip I followed that I said was a faff because each vegetable required individula frying with slightly different seasonings - I had another look through my book, and each of the six individual veg has a recipe page of its own, so in effect in the one dish I made seven different Korean dishes. Also gives an idea as to why the book is so fat!

She is indeed. Plenty of recipes there..... Next step is for me to get off the computer and out to the shops over the weekend instead of working.