Food Overview and Korean Cooking Experience (Stateside)

Currently, I have eaten a total of four Korean meals prepared at restaurants in my efforts to prepare my palate for Korean flavors and textures. These four meals were dolsot bibimbap (돌솥 비빔밥) in North Carolina, beef bulgogi (불고기), more dolsot bibimbap, and Jjajangmyeon (짜장면) in Tennessee.

Bibimbap is a mixed meal that usually includes warm rice and sauteed vegetables, chili pepper paste, sometimes meat, and usually an egg (either raw or fried). You're supposed to mix it all up right before you eat it, and it's really prettily arranged before mixing. The dolsot part of it means 'stone pot' so the only difference is that it's cooked in a dangerously hot seasoned stoneware bowl, and actually, the bowl is so hot it keeps cooking the food (which helps with the raw egg bit). I thoroughly enjoyed this both times I had it, though the first time was more like a soup.

Bulgogi is usually a dish of thinly-sliced marinated beef, or sometimes pork or chicken. I've seen a lot of variations with how it can be served, and it seems like it's roughly the equivalent to our hamburger in how easy it is to find. Plus, it's fairly easy for Western palates to enjoy it, from what I can tell! Bulgogi actually has a pretty long history--around 1,500-2,000+ years since it was developed as a royal dish! Here's one bulgogi recipe I found, and here's another recipe that I sort of used myself! My aunt has a recipe that she has used for years, and maybe if I get it, I can post it later.

Jjajangmyeon is a little harder to describe because I'm less familiar with it. It's a brothy noodle dish using wheat noodles and a mild, salty, black soybean sauce. When I had it, the dish included chicken, but it can be made with other meats or seafood. Unfortunately, the noodles were a bit messy to eat, and accidentally slurping them led to black bean speckles all over my napkin, table, and shirt. I was glad I ate this alone the first time...!

Nearly all of these meals were served with kimchi in one form or another, which is arguably the most well-known Korean food. This spicy, fermented vegetable food is considered a staple, and Koreans might even eat it three times a day (yep, that includes breakfast. That'd be like having sauerkraut for breakfast after you mixed in a few teaspoons of ground red pepper). vegetables used to make it vary, but cabbage and radish are typical.

Banchan--small side dishes--are customarily served with Korean dinners (more formal dinners have more banchan). At first, I thought these were sort of like condiments, but they're considered actual side dishes, and they're shared communally from small dishes in the middle of the table. Here are some banchan recipes. I've had a range of banchan, including: cold cooked broccoli, bean sprouts, potato pancake, spaghetti squash pancake, deep-fried anchovies, pickled cucumbers and radishes, sea grass, and several others. Most of the ones I've eaten have been cold, which is a bit of an adjustment.

With all of those chances to sample Korean food, my mom and I decided to make some ourselves, so we started with bulgogi and went from there. I found kimchi in a jar at Kroger (can't seem to find it at Wal-Mart), and it's fairly tasty, though I can't speak as to its authenticity. From start to finish lasted from 2:30pm when I started marinating the meat to 9:00pm when we finished dinner. We also made five banchan. The food was decent, though I still prefer other Asian foods and flavors. If I get a chance, I'll write more about that whole cooking experience later!