Side dishes Recipes

Korean Seasoned Perilla Sprout Namul

Young perilla shoots have tender stems and an even stronger herbal scent than the mature leaves. The 40-second blanch is short on purpose to protect that aroma, and a doenjang dressing with perilla oil, pressed from the same plant's seeds, layers the scent instead of covering it.

Prep 10min Cook 3min 2 servings

Korean Kkaennip Gamja Bokkeum (Perilla Potato Stir-fry)

Perilla oil and shredded perilla leaves make this smell much stronger than the usual potato stir-fry. The soy sauce is poured into an empty spot in the hot pan and allowed to bubble before it is stirred through, and in that moment it picks up a faintly scorched, toasty smell that carries over to the potatoes.

Prep 12min Cook 15min 2 servings

Prep 10min Cook 10min 2 servings

Korean Steamed Soybean Sprouts

With only 80 ml of water in the pot, the sprouts cook in trapped steam under the chili-soy seasoning rather than being blanched first and dressed afterward. That small amount of liquid is why the sprouts are drained but not shaken bone dry: a little surface water tops up that steaming liquid.

⚡ 20-Minute Recipes

Prep 20min Cook 10min 4 servings

Korean Pickled Garlic (Soy-Vinegar Aged Whole Cloves)

After three months or more in the brine, whole garlic cloves lose their raw bite and turn springy, salty, and sweet. Freshly packed cloves still taste sharp, because this long-keeping pickle, traditionally made with the new garlic of June, is meant to sit for months. The repeated cycle of draining, reboiling, and cooling the brine is what lets the jar keep that long, and the brine always goes in cold, since hot liquid partially cooks the cloves and dulls their texture. Eat them one at a time alongside fatty grilled pork belly or short ribs.

Side dishes Medium

Korean Soy Braised Cockles

Blood cockles (kkomak) are blanched only until the shells crack open, then tossed in a soy, garlic and Cheongyang chili sauce for just 5 to 6 minutes. Short cooking is the whole point, because these chewy little clams turn rubbery fast.

Prep 20min Cook 12min 2 servings

Stir-fry Medium

Korean Duck and Perilla Leaf Stir-fry

Smoked duck comes already seasoned, so the soy sauce is kept light, and no oil is added because the duck's own fat is enough to cook the onion and sauce. The sauce is gochujang with maesil-cheong (green plum syrup), and two cheongyang chilies go in with the onion.

Prep 18min Cook 14min 4 servings

Prep 10min Cook 20min 2 servings

Korean Steamed Whole Garlic

Steaming the peeled cloves for 8 minutes before they ever touch the sauce is what sets this apart from garlic simply braised in a pan. The cloves arrive in the soy and syrup already slightly translucent, so a short, gentle braise softens them through without burning the outside. Raw bite turns mellow and sweet, and each clove ends up glossy and intact, a small side to eat with rice or alongside grilled meat.

Prep 20min Cook 10min 4 servings

Korean Garlic Scape Soy Pickles

Garlic scapes start out sharp and garlicky, and the soy brine slowly rounds that bite off, though it returns with every chew. A piece of kelp simmered in the brine adds a soft sea savoriness, and the sliced cheongyang chiles go in only as the heat is turned off and leave just a little heat at the finish. Pressing out air bubbles with a spoon keeps every piece submerged, and only a clean utensil goes into the jar.

Korean Seasoned Shishito Pepper Banchan

Shishito peppers are blanched for just 40 seconds and tossed in a doenjang dressing. Unlike the braised shishito dish, where the peppers simmer in sauce, these stay crisp and bright green. Now and then one turns out to be hot.

Prep 8min Cook 3min 4 servings

Korean Perilla Leaf Beef Stir-Fry

Twenty perilla leaves go in, but they never actually cook over the flame. The soy-marinated beef is stir-fried, the heat is turned off, and only then are the leaves folded in for twenty seconds of residual heat; any longer and they blacken.

Prep 10min Cook 10min 2 servings

Prep 15min Cook 25min 2 servings

Korean Braised Pork with Garlic Scapes

With only half a tablespoon of gochujang against soy sauce and oyster sauce, this braise leans salty and savory rather than red and fiery. That small spoonful of chili paste has to dissolve fully into the soy and oyster sauce, or the pork and scapes end up unevenly seasoned. Lean pork tenderloin, sliced across the grain about 1 cm thick, stays tender through a short simmer while its juices enrich the sauce. Adding the garlic scapes only after the liquid has dropped by half lets them soak up that sauce and still keep their crunch and mild, sharp bite. Left too long they turn stringy, which is why the pan comes off the heat with a spoonful of glossy sauce left for the rice.

Prep 30min Cook 5min 4 servings

Korean Garlic Scape Kimchi

Fruit sweetness from ground pear and onion, the base of the chili paste, cushions the heat. The sharp, prickly garlic smell of the scapes survives fermentation and stays in the kimchi alongside their snap. Thirty minutes in coarse salt is just enough for the stalks to bend a little, which lets the thick paste wrap around them. A short two-hour start at room temperature comes before the fridge, and the flavor turns riper after about two days.

Side dishes Medium

Korean Soybean Leaf Doenjang Muchim

Soybean leaves are bigger and thicker than perilla leaves, and here they are boiled and dressed with doenjang and perilla oil, country style. Fresh ones appear only in summer and turn up more at rural markets or farm stands than in supermarkets. They need 5 to 6 minutes of boiling to soften the tough fibers, but much longer and their nutty aroma fades.

Prep 12min Cook 8min 4 servings

Korean Perilla Sprout & Tofu Soybean Paste Stir-fry

Perilla sprouts are far more tender than perilla leaves and smell only faintly of perilla, and here they are tossed with browned tofu in thinned doenjang (Korean soybean paste). Thickly shredded perilla leaves can stand in when sprouts are hard to find, though the scent gets noticeably stronger and the bite tougher.

Prep 14min Cook 8min 2 servings

Prep 15min Cook 18min 4 servings

Korean Garlic Scape Anchovy Braise

The small anchovies are toasted in a dry pan and set aside, while the garlic scapes cook first in the soy glaze; the fish only returns for the last couple of minutes so it stays crisp-chewy instead of hard. Scapes are never blanched, which keeps them bright green with a snap at the center.

🍱 Lunchbox

Prep 15min Cook 8min 4 servings

Korean Pickled Garlic Scapes

Unlike whole-garlic jangajji, which waits for a cooled brine, garlic scapes get the brine while it is still boiling. That heat lightly cooks the surface, so each 4 cm piece snaps cleanly when bitten. Whole peppercorns slowly release a warm, spicy aroma into the liquid as the jar ages. The scapes are edible the next day, though day three is when the seasoning reaches the center and the crunch is still intact.

Korean Seasoned Bean Sprouts

The lid stays on for the full 3 minutes of boiling; lift it early and the sprouts keep a raw, beany smell. A quick cold rinse right after draining keeps the stems snappy, and squeezing out the water keeps the sesame oil and garlic dressing from going thin.

Prep 5min Cook 5min 4 servings

Korean Stir-Fried Shishito Peppers and Chicken Tenderloin

A shallow slit in each shishito pepper (kkwarigochu) lets the soy and oyster sauce seep inside and keeps the peppers from bursting in the pan. The chicken tenderloin they cook with has almost no fat and a mild, clean taste.

Prep 15min Cook 12min 2 servings

🍱 Lunchbox 🧒 Snacks for Kids

Korean Soy-Braised Quail Eggs

Kelp flavors the soy broth only briefly and comes out before the eggs go in, since a long simmer turns it heavy and muddy. Whole garlic cloves braise alongside the quail eggs until soft and mellow, while a single Cheongyang chili joins in the final minutes to add a sharp edge without making the dish fiery. The eggs come out mahogany outside and seasoned toward the yolk, easy one-bite pieces for a lunchbox.

Prep 20min Cook 25min 4 servings

Kimchi Medium

Butterbur Stem Jangajji

Butterbur stems carry a sharp astringency that a long cold-water soak after blanching draws out, while the stalks keep their fibrous structure. The stringy outer layer has to be pulled off first; left on, it stays tough in the jar. Pouring the soy, vinegar and sugar brine, steeped with kelp, over the stems while it is still hot keeps them crisp for longer. Sliced garlic and cheongyang chili give the salty pickle a streak of heat.

Prep 80min Cook 15min 4 servings

Korean Garlic Scape Salad

In Seoul and Gyeonggi people mostly say maneuljong, and elsewhere often maneuljjong, but both mean the same curling flower stalk of the garlic plant. Tender spring scapes get just 20 to 30 seconds in boiling water before going into a gochujang, vinegar, and sugar dressing, and they stay bright green with a firm snap.

Prep 10min Cook 3min 4 servings

Korean Stir-fried Anchovies with Shishito Peppers

The shishito peppers stay in the oil until a few dark blisters appear on the skins, which is where their slightly bitter aroma comes from. The tiny anchovies are toasted separately in a dry pan beforehand until crumbly, and they only rejoin the peppers when the heat is lowered and the syrup goes in.

Prep 10min Cook 9min 4 servings