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There's a stereotype that makgeolli is for poor people/old people/farmers. gently caress 'em, it's the only good Korean alcohol. It's the only one I'll miss if I leave here.
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Mar 6, 2014 02:47
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I can answer, but they are subjective and based on what me/my fiancee think and do. Others are free to contradict me at anytime. 1) I've been living off Korean food for my ~6 years of living here, and I'd say that basic fare tends to be the stews and soups. I pretty much eat Kimchi stew, Doenjang stew, Daikon soup, Bean sprout soup, etc. Fried rice breaks up the stews once in a while, and I'd have to toss in pan-fried pork about once a week or so. Since I'm getting married in a couple months my fiancee has cut our meat intake down (stupid diet) so it's more of a once-every-other-week kind of thing now. Of course, as with all Korean dishes, my mains are accompanied by rice and 2-3 side dishes. Kimchi, sauced dried anchovies/squid/shrimp, boiled sparrow eggs, that kind of thing. 2) I use a Cuchen rice cooker (marketed as Lihom in the states, I believe), but the model I use doesn't appear to be on sale in the US. Mine is a 3 cup dealie that cost me about $75, but it appears they are way more expensive in the states. Koreans love Cuckoo and Cuchen so if you look for those brands you'll have a "top of the line" cooker. Are they worth it? Well, I think so. I grew up in Hawaii and ate rice everyday. I used to use just a crockpot kind of cooker, the kind with a simple on/off switch and a pot lid without any seal. The rice was fine, but when I moved to Korea the cookers here are so much better. The cooker can hold rice for a good solid 2 days before it starts to get old, the flavor is better, and the cook is more even. Ask yourself, is rice a staple you eat everyday? If yes, go for a Cuckoo/Lihom cooker. If no, well then anything will do. 3) 막걸리 is not really strange, but it definitely is a "Korean" thing to drink. I love it, I drink it all the time, but even after spending 6 years in country and speaking the language fairly well I still get people asking me "You drink Makgeolli?" I guess I still get people asking if I eat kimchi though, so ... If you are buying it in the states (or abroad in general) you might get some weird looks, but you aren't really doing anything strange. I'd say it's kind of an older man drink, but nothing extreme. Younger people in Seoul tend to do more of the Beer/soju thing, which is not to say that they don't drink Makgeolli because they do. It's just a more occasional thing. To talk a little bit more about Makgeolli, it's got a good craft situation in Korea, much better than beer, in my opinion. If you look around a bit you can find all kinds of varieties of it, and all of them are slightly different. Omija Makgeolli, Chestnut makgeolli, and sweet potato makgeolli are some of my favorites. The "Park Jeong Hee" president makgeolli is also good, but it is a little bitter for my tastes. If you (or others) are in Seoul and want to try some out let me know, I can point you to a couple decent restaurants that serve them and, possibly, might even organize a meet up. I love me some makgeolli! *edit* Yeah, what Grand Fromage said.
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Mar 6, 2014 03:00
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There's supposed to be a mak joint on line 4 that has a kind of lambic makgeolli from a culture he has in a cave in Gapyeong. Also, yes. Lummox and i used to do weekly to bi-monthly makgeolli dates, which is something we could start up again.
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Mar 6, 2014 03:50
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@Panda: You eat rice every day. There's the basic white, or the multi grain if you prefer. Both are nice in their own ways. Kimchi for sure is an every day food. I like the cabbage stuff, but love the daikon and cucumber varieties too. Aside from that, it's whatever bits and bobs you can find, cooked up with a bit of sesame oil, various flavourings (garlic, ginger, onion, scallion, sugar, soy sauce, etc) and served on the side so you can get a bit with your rice. Makkoli is an old people drink. Like a really old people drink.
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Mar 6, 2014 14:28
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Thanks for the replies everyone! About rice - warning: ignorant American  question incoming - it's surprising that rice is such a staple of the Korean diet, and that so many Koreans are thinner and healthier than Americans. Is it that Koreans eat less meat? more vegetables? smaller portions?And I'm in Los Angeles and am fortunate to have easy access to makgeolli and other unusual items in many large Korean supermarkets. It's interesting that there are so many varieties, because I've only ever seen two kinds, both by Kooksondang, one in a green bottle and another in a tan bottle. I prefer the green one for sure.
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Mar 6, 2014 19:47
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With most Asian diets, you're likely going to end up thinner, because you eat fewer calories than westerners do. When my mum would take us to India (when I was young) my relatives had cookware that was the size of individual bowls back in the USA. And that cookware was for a family of four. Yeah, you eat a lot of rice, but a lot is relative. When the cooking pots are tiny, you're not about to make huge quantities. When you have more people coming over, you just add on another course. So if the family is used to (for example) some rice, a stewed vegetable, and a bean, you'd then add (for extra guests, in no particular order): chopped raw vegetables, sauteed greens, spiced root vegetables, pickled vegetables, stewed bean and vegetables, dry roasted things of various sorts, etc. Never is any one dish made in huge quantities. When you're deep frying things like bajji and samosa, you make about one or MAYBE two per person if you're feeling generous. In the USA, my mum would make enough of those fried things for us to make a meal out of it. Because of that, she'd make it only rarely. Instead, my Indian relatives would have their fried things a couple of times a week, but have literally one or two pieces tops. You can pin it down to more vegetables, less meat, lots of fresh ingredients, and whatever else you'd like, but at the end of the day, it's the lack of calories. Also, for the people who've seen giant portions of soup or things on Korean restaurants and the like, bear in mind that the bulk of that soup or whatever is water. It may be a giant bowl, but it's a giant bowl of water.
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Mar 6, 2014 20:46
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So my kimchi knowledge is pretty cursory. There's a paste and your vegetables. I followed Ed Lee's recipe for my first batch, and it was pretty cool. I think I let it ferment for two days, and I've been eating it ever since. It's not even close to a heavy ferment, but I'm pretty close to eating it all. I want it super fermented! I've heard that you can reuse kimchi like a starter for subsequent batches. Is it possible to use old kimchi as a paste for a new batch? Would I kill myself if I did this? I was thinking of throwing it in a processor and making it really nice and smooth. Roy Choi's recipe calls for 1 cup peeled onion, so I was thinking of doing a cup of my old kimchi instead... Edit: gently caress it, I'm doing it anyways, we'll see how it goes.
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Mar 6, 2014 21:30
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Yeah, you can jump start subsequent batches of kimchi with the old one. My brother does it all the time when he's too lazy to make more of the paste. However, bear in mind that the kimchi becomes more and more watery, and less intensely flavoured. Your mileage may vary.
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Mar 6, 2014 22:01
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Archer2338 posted:Similar to omelet has me thinking 계란말이? Kind of similar to an omelet except it's rolled up and then cut into pieces much like kimbap. Eggs, some greens, and cheese was usually in my mother's recipe. Are we 100% certain that it was a Korean dish? It sounds like bahn xeo to me. It looks like an omelette but it actually a fried pancake. And is very delicious.
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Mar 6, 2014 23:14
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Shbobdb posted:Are we 100% certain that it was a Korean dish? It sounds like bahn xeo to me. It looks like an omelette but it actually a fried pancake. And is very delicious. Def a Korean dish - http://koreanfood.about.com/od/sidedishesbanchan/r/Gaeranmari.htm I love banh xeo, but its a batter based fried dish, not egg based.
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Mar 7, 2014 00:30
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pandariot posted:About rice - warning: ignorant American It's something of a mystery to us here, too, between all the rice and all the sugar. Korean portion sizes aren't that different, especially at restaurants. You get a lot more exercise here since you walk everywhere. I live in the city with the highest rate of car ownership in the country, a whopping 36%. The level of fatness is definitely increasing though. People also restrict rice intake at times. Korean Air flight attendants aren't allowed to eat rice, for an example.
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Mar 7, 2014 01:58
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BULGOGI? Bizarre New York Times ad, and the article about it is equally confusing. "Spring's here and I'm ready to play! And you know what got me through training? Bulgogi."
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Mar 15, 2014 01:40
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I like that the picture appears to be from a Sears yearbook studio in 1983. Korea is incredibly bad at tourist advertising, they've done this a few times with different foods and it's always hilariously bad. The bibimbap ad about how it was an offering food at funerals is my favorite. People love thinking about their impending death when choosing lunch. They actually had a thing in my city soliciting ideas on how to advertise Korean food to westerners, but I don't think they really cared. My suggestion was stop with the "traditional" poo poo, you need to hook people on something easy and draw them in. So, promote Korean fried chicken and barbecue. Literally any non-vegetarian westerner is on board with those because they're amazing, they're different enough to intrigue you into more Korean stuff, but familiar enough that no one's going to be intimidated. Bulgogi isn't a bad introductory food but that ad is terrible. No one knows who Choo is (this is why you consult non-Koreans) and there's zero information about bulgogi. I love that Dokdo is on the website too, of course it is.
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Mar 15, 2014 03:03
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Grand Fromage posted:My suggestion was stop with the "traditional" poo poo, you need to hook people on something easy and draw them in. So, promote Korean fried chicken and barbecue. Literally any non-vegetarian westerner is on board with those because they're amazing, they're different enough to intrigue you into more Korean stuff, but familiar enough that no one's going to be intimidated. I think they should go with customizable bibimbap where you can choose your own ingredients from a big selection.
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Mar 15, 2014 03:50
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How am I supposed to drink soju?
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Mar 15, 2014 16:28
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Lawman 0 posted:How am I supposed to drink soju? Frequently and in large amounts
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Mar 15, 2014 17:15
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Casu Marzu posted:Frequently and in large amounts ...but broken up into shots because it's got a job to do.
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Mar 15, 2014 17:33
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Lawman 0 posted:How am I supposed to drink soju? You can also mix it with beer but that is a truly vile combination of terrible flavors which is nevertheless forced down because your boss refuses to believe that he is no longer a poor college student.
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Mar 15, 2014 17:41
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With juice, if you have the tastebuds of a middle school girl. (just kidding, it is good that way) You can also mix it with Calpis and soda water, which was my favorite drink in high school. Japanese drink it in cold oolong tea sometimes which is actually pretty good.
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Mar 15, 2014 19:13
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Lawman 0 posted:How am I supposed to drink soju? Open bottle. Pour bottle down drain. Purchase makgeolli and drink it. The wisest statement ever made in the Korea living thread was "Free soju is too expensive."
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Mar 15, 2014 19:26
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I thought soju was pretty decent. We just drank it straight and I had to be advised to place my glass upside down if I no longer wanted it filled. I drank a lot of soju on y 2 day trip.
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Mar 16, 2014 07:06
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Mar 16, 2014 07:50
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MonkeyBot posted:I thought soju was pretty decent. We just drank it straight and I had to be advised to place my glass upside down if I no longer wanted it filled. I drank a lot of soju on y 2 day trip. And I totally agree that soju, if you HAVE to drink it for whatever reason, is best drank by itself since it's the quickest way to drink it. It's not bad with Gopchang, though. It also pisses me off that Soju costs like $10-15 per bottle in restaurants over here in the states. The gently caress?
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Mar 16, 2014 08:24
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Archer2338 posted:It also pisses me off that Soju costs like $10-15 per bottle in restaurants over here in the states. The gently caress? It's a stupid tax for drinking soju when there is actual alcohol available.
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Mar 16, 2014 08:35
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Archer2338 posted:That's.... odd. I think the usual way is to not empty the glass entirely? It's considered rude if you let someone's glass stay empty, but it's also considered rather coercive if you fill a not-emptied glass. Oh it was only filled if I emptied it and left it upright. Went out with a bunch of office workers and their boss after work both nights, I think they were a bit concerned after I drank like 9 of hose little glasses. Ah to bee young and dumb.
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Mar 16, 2014 12:11
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Posted this in the Goon kakao, but I thought it might do some good here. My fiancee and I mess around once or twice a week with various ingredients trying to make interesting new foods. Most of the time it's something really simple and either comes out just like a normal dish or is a total disaster. Last night though.... Perfection. Do you like Jeon? If so, I got a really simple and easy recipe that makes a mean Jeon for very low price. What you need; 2 eggs 1 package of 팽이버섯 (Enokitake mushrooms according to the dictionary?) 1 can of tuna (I used tuna in oil, water might not have the same flavor) 1) Wash the mushrooms and chop them to about 1-2 inches in length 2) Drain the oil from the tuna 3) Beat two eggs in a bowl 4) mix everything together in the bowl 5) Put some cooking oil on your pan, heat that bastard up on med-high or high heat 6) Pan fry the mix, you want to make small little pancakes of it, not one huge circle. Aim for about as wide as your palm as a max size. 7) Serve with some soy sauce for dipping. The dish really came out tasting like roast pork belly, the flavor was really that good. It's cheap, takes like 5 minutes, and is (relatively) healthy. Try it out, let me know what you guys think. My fiancee and I both love to cook, and we hope to eventually take our cooking skills back to the US and put them to work in a B&B so feedback from less.... Koreanized palates is always welcome.
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Mar 26, 2014 01:00
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An addition to sites to watch for recipes. http://koreancookinglab.com A primer on the spring greens that are already on their way out though depending where you live you could see them in May. http://seoulistmag.com/articles/read/bom_namul_a_taste_of_spring
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Apr 9, 2014 03:43
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This is my third time making the MAKGALBIJJIM? (Braised Beef Short Ribs) recipe from Maangchi: http://www.maangchi.com/recipe/makgalbijjim I made this and took the shots before I knew there was a Korean thread, and I'm definitely a rookie at making Korean food. I really like this recipe because it is delicious, inexpensive and relatively easy. Ingredients: 2 pounds of bone in beef short ribs. (You can use boneless too) 1 large onion (1½ cups’ worth), pureed 6-8 garlic cloves, minced 2 bosc pears (about 1½ cups’ worth), peeled, cored, and pureed 2 ts worth of ginger, minced 3 tbs soy sauce 1 tbs brown sugar ½ ts ground black pepper 1 ts sesame oil 1 tbs toasted sesame seeds green peas and pine nuts for garnish (optional) Broth (beef, miso, whatever, optional) Something for heat (optional, I used a bit of sriracha and cayenne) 1 tbs rice wine vingear (optional, I thought it needed some acidity) Directions: Gather up your ingredients, Narangansett optional, start time: 8:15 PM, already pretty hungry, one tall boy in.  You'll need one large pot and one small pot (for making of rice).  MMM. Beefy goodness. Trim the fat off your ribs with the sharpest knife you have. I found it's helpful to put the ribs in the freezer for 10 mins before you do this. Knife too, for good measure. The cold makes the butchery a little easier. Then score them down to the bone a few times.  Blanch the ribs in boiling water for 5 minutes.  Rinse them in cold water and drain.  Put the ribs in a heavy bottomed pot. Add onion, garlic, ginger, brown sugar, pears, soy sauce, ground black pepper, and 1 cup of water. All the ingredients except the ribs can be done in the food processor for ease. Just rough chop and toss them in. I added a little of the stock to help things along too. You don't need a food processor, you just have to do a finer chop.  Smells good man.   Cover and cook over medium heat for 30 minutes. Add water or stock so the ribs are mostly covered. Add optional rice wine vinegar and cayenne/sriracha to taste.  Go ahead and start up your rice, since I'm doing brown rice it takes about an hour on the stove top.  Give the ribs a good stir and turn down the heat. Cover and simmer for 20 minutes.  Open the lid and turn up the heat. Keep stirring and cooking until the ribs turn shiny and the juice is almost gone.   Add green peas for color (optional) and transfer to a serving plate. Sprinkle with toasted sesame seeds and pine nuts.    I thought it was delicious, although it always takes longer than I think it will (2 hrs 15 mins prep & cook) and as a result I am usually drunk and starving when it is finally ready. Snacks would help. Also I used a little too much ginger, maybe 2x what the recipe calls for. I would stick to 1.5x if you like ginger. Leopold Stotch fucked around with this message at 19:08 on Apr 15, 2014 |
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Apr 15, 2014 18:37
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Is that enough time to break down the connective tissue in the ribs? Or are they still a bit chewy? Have you tried without blanching? Or with browning them in the western style? Thing that always throws me is the boiling of meat and the boiling and rinsing or soaking or washing to get rid of the 'smell'. Try a side by side of different methods maybe and report back. -TIA
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Apr 16, 2014 04:18
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DontAskKant posted:Is that enough time to break down the connective tissue in the ribs? Or are they still a bit chewy? They were not completely fork tender, nor did they slide off the bone, but they definitely were not at all chewy. I thought the texture was about right for beef short ribs. I haven't tried this recipe without blanching or with browning. DontAskKant posted:Thing that always throws me is the boiling of meat and the boiling and rinsing or soaking or washing to get rid of the 'smell'. Try a side by side of different methods maybe and report back. -TIA I'll gladly try making them next time with browning instead of blanching, but I think a side by side comparison might require making them in two different pots, lest I lose track of which ribs had been done in which manner, and I'm not sure I'm up for that effort wise.
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Apr 16, 2014 13:56
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The "get rid of the smell" thing is commonly cited for various meat prep techniques here, such as preboiling, soaking in vinegar, or soaking in milk. I suspect this is a holdover from the famine days when you couldn't be picky about how rotten your food was, much like the standard cooking technique of boiling things forever makes sense if they're questionably safe. I skip all those steps and instead throw my meat away if it smells. And I get live shellfish instead of boiling dead ones for 30 minutes to sterilize them. I've only seen one preboiling thing that made sense, which was to get out clotted blood and general gunk when making ramen broth. It didn't change the flavor but the broth comes out that nice pinky porky color, whereas if you don't boil and clean the bones up first it is a lot browner.
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Apr 16, 2014 14:07
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Grand Fromage posted:I skip all those steps and instead throw my meat away if it smells. Sensible, and informative. Thanks. No more meat boiling for me, and that will probably shave 20 mins off the total prep & cook time.
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Apr 16, 2014 14:34
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That's our idea though, the explanation we hear may be "because of meat smell", but a lot of Koreans we know don't really know how to cook and voiced reasons for things don't always overlap with the original reason. If you can swing using two small pots instead it might be a good experiment. Boil and no boil. Then another with browning. I always end up cooking Korean food through the lens of French cooking. The first time I tried to eat kong namul guk bap 콩나물국밥 I didn't really know how to eat it so i seasoned the egg yolk with the condiments and added the boiling broth to the yolk bit by bit to make a savory custard to dip the bean sprouts in. Obviously not the traditional method.
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Apr 16, 2014 14:46
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DontAskKant posted:That's our idea though, the explanation we hear may be "because of meat smell", but a lot of Koreans we know don't really know how to cook and voiced reasons for things don't always overlap with the original reason. If you can swing using two small pots instead it might be a good experiment. Boil and no boil. Then another with browning. Yeah, this is true. I've met vanishingly few people here who have ever cooked, and those who do are constantly in disbelief that I am capable of boiling water. I've brought homemade kimchi to work and people still didn't actually believe I made it. Plus language issues. If you can try all three that'd be awesome. Beef is prohibitively expensive over here, I'm not loaded enough to experiment with it.
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Apr 16, 2014 14:53
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Ok Sure, since there's interest, the next time I am cooking for a group I will cover the stove with pots, try to keep the other variables as consistent as possible, and get sciencey with ribs.
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Apr 16, 2014 17:34
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If there's interest I'll do a primer on making Korean fermented teas. It's almost Korean plum/maesil/매실 season and that means little old ladies hauling carts with 50kg of sugar and 50kg of fruit. The Korean fermented teas are usually fruit mixed with sugar and let sit for at least 30 days for some like quince and lemon and up to 10 years for some 매실청. They are usually mixed with hot water or cold water and served with ice (this is new). I've been turning yuja tea into fast hot toddies and the unripe peach version is great as a whisky cocktail. Used in culinary stuff too. I'd suggest ignoring most of the health cures they purport to have though. Don't worry non Asia living folk there is stuff you can do too. Just tell me where you live and I can tell you what you can use.
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Apr 16, 2014 17:48
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매실청 is pretty great when you dilute it with water and put it on ice. My favorite summer drink, with ice cold barley tea coming in second. Mixing the maesil concentrate with barley tea also works, and gives a slightly different taste. Give it a try!
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Apr 16, 2014 20:29
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DontAskKant posted:If there's interest I'll do a primer on making Korean fermented teas. It's almost Korean plum/maesil/매실 season and that means little old ladies hauling carts with 50kg of sugar and 50kg of fruit.
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Apr 16, 2014 21:46
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DontAskKant posted:That's our idea though, the explanation we hear may be "because of meat smell", but a lot of Koreans we know don't really know how to cook and voiced reasons for things don't always overlap with the original reason. If you can swing using two small pots instead it might be a good experiment. Boil and no boil. Then another with browning. My fiance always does the boil a bit, toss initial water, reboil thing. She told me it's to get rid of a lot of the blood/fat and make the meat more... I dunno how to put it, but I guess "pure?" I always do it just to get rid of all the dunk that builds up when boiling meats. Then again, my Galbijjim comes out nothing like Leopold Scotch's, for starters I don't blend all of the vegetables into a past but rather chop them up a little smaller than his and boil it all in the water together. Lets you eat some vegetables along with your beef, and chunks up the galbijjim overall. Next time I make it I can document how my fiance and I do it if you like. However, as has been pointed out, beef is way expensive over here and my fiancee and I eat it maybe once a year. We make galbijjim more frequently with pork, and I think the boiling step is much more important with the extra fattiness of pork.
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Apr 16, 2014 22:35
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| # ? May 28, 2024 02:04 |
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Why would you want to get rid of the part that has the most flavor? 
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Apr 17, 2014 02:25
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