1880 Korean recipes. Page 71 of 79. Compare ingredients and cooking times. Korean Braised Tofu and King Oyster Mushrooms.
Pan-fried tofu and thick-cut king oyster mushrooms share the same spicy soy and gochujang sauce but feel completely different to bite: one soft, the other springy. Browning the tofu slowly over low heat until the edges firm up gives the sauce a surface to cling to.
Naengi (shepherd's purse, a spring green) is spread over doenjang-seasoned rice to steam, and when the lid comes off its earthy spring scent rushes out. The doenjang is first fried in perilla oil with zucchini and onion, so every grain picks up its savory depth.
Osam takes its name from the first syllables of squid (ojingeo) and pork belly (samgyeopsal). The pork belly is cooked first until plenty of fat has rendered, and the squid and gochujang sauce go into that fat, so no extra oil is needed.
Clams and shepherd's purse both tend to carry grit. Purge the clams well in salted water and rub the dirt from between the naengi roots by hand, or the clear broth ends up with sand in every spoonful.
King oyster mushrooms soak up the soy broth and turn light brown, giving this quail egg braise a meaty chew alongside the soft eggs. The mushrooms braise first until they wilt and soak up plenty of seasoning, while the eggs join later and never simmer long enough to toughen. Mushrooms sliced at least 1 cm thick hold on to that chew. With no chili at all, just garlic and black pepper, it stays mild, and a spoonful of syrup at the end adds shine and rounds off the saltiness. Stored in the fridge with its remaining broth, both mushrooms and eggs stay moist, which makes it an easy side to portion into packed lunches.
The octopus gets two minutes over high heat, and the rice goes in as soon as it starts to curl. That leaves no time to mix sauce in the pan; it is stirred smooth before the burner is lit. For less heat, the chili flakes are dropped and gochujang used alone.
Chicken in a thin starch coat gets its gloss from a soy, vinegar and sugar sauce. The pineapple goes in just before the sauce and needs only a minute, until its edges look faintly translucent. Canned pineapple works too, drained lightly first.
Dried pollack, a winter pantry staple, meets the first shepherd's purse dug up in spring. The pollack strips are not soaked, only rinsed of dust and toasted in sesame oil, because a long soak would leave their savoriness behind in the water.
The shrimp steam on a bed of onion, green onion, and garlic, and the rising vapor carries those aromas in between the shells. Apart from a splash of rice wine and a squeeze of lemon there is no seasoning, which puts the shrimp's own sweetness at the center. The steaming stops within 8-9 minutes, before overcooking can shrink the flesh and make it stiff.
Two cheongyang chilies and a tablespoon of chili flakes make this properly hot. The octopus is tipped over the rice with all the loose sauce left in the pan, and bean sprouts can go down on the rice first for a crunchy layer underneath.
A generous amount of finely shredded ginger gives mild chicken breast a sharp, warming smell. The cabbage and bell pepper are not cooked for long, so they still crunch.
The roots of shepherd's purse carry an earthy, mineral smell and the leaves a mild bitterness. Cutting both and mixing them evenly before cooking spreads each flavor through the pot. Pressing the doenjang through a sieve keeps the anchovy stock clear while still giving it fermented depth.
Store-bought boneless jokbal, Korean braised pig's trotters that are already cooked, gets a second short simmer in a soy, sugar, and ginger glaze, turning it into a warm, glossy dish in well under an hour. As it cools, the gelatin-rich skin sets with the glaze into a pleasantly chewy texture, which makes leftovers worth eating cold.
The flying fish roe stays in the fridge until the moment of rolling; once it warms up, the skins slacken and the eggs stop popping. Inside there is only a thin line of mayonnaise and cucumber, and a little more roe goes on the cut faces.
Because the pan runs on high heat, perilla oil is not used alone but mixed in equal parts with neutral oil. The king oyster mushrooms are cut lengthwise into long strips that keep their grain, and ground perilla seed goes in over low heat for the last minute to thicken the little bit of soy broth.
There is a spoonful of doenjang, but only as a base seasoning, and this tastes more like a clear beef soup made with brisket browned in sesame oil than a doenjang soup. Spring shepherd's purse brings an earthy green scent into the meaty broth.
Thick slices of Korean radish line the pot and soak up the soy broth, while the Spanish mackerel rests on top, never touching the bottom, so its soft flesh keeps its shape. A short rest in rice wine before cooking tones down the fishy smell, and the seasoning stays light with just soy sauce and garlic. Cheongyang chili added at the end gives the mild broth a clean, spicy finish, and the radish is as much a part of the meal as the fish.
Unlike kabocha porridge, where the squash is steamed and blended, this porridge starts by boiling chunks of mature Korean pumpkin in water until no pieces remain, and the cooking liquid becomes the base. Neulgeun hobak is watery and only mildly sweet, so glutinous rice flour sets the thickness and sugar supplies the sweetness. Season with sugar at the very end, after the beans go in; the beans mute the sweetness, and seasoning earlier means correcting it twice. Dissolve the rice flour in water and strain it, or raw lumps will hide in the pot. Dried red beans take far longer than the pumpkin, so they go on the stove first, or use ready-cooked beans and skip that stage.
Garlic cooked in butter, then soy sauce and sugar bubbling down, leave the shrimp with a sweet-salty shine. Shrimp shrink and toughen soon after they are cooked through, and the soy and sugar are mixed ahead to go in the moment the shrimp are done.
Not every gomtang is milky. This Naju gomtang uses no bones, only lean brisket and shank simmered over low heat for more than two hours, which keeps the broth clear; turn up the heat and it clouds quickly. The cooked beef is shredded or thinly sliced and reheated in the broth before serving.
Spanish mackerel has white, tender flesh that flakes apart easily once cooked, so this braise never flips the fish. Instead, the pot gets a gentle shake and the sauce is spooned over the top. A gapless bed of radish, thicker slices in the middle, keeps the fish off the pot. The red sauce of soy, gochujang and gochugaru seasons both the mild flesh and the radish, which turns translucent as it cooks.
A shallow crosshatch on the inside of the squid makes each piece curl into a thick, bouncy roll the moment it hits the heat, and the opened cuts give the gochujang sauce more surface to grab. Onion and cabbage go into the pan first to cook off their water so the sauce stays glossy.
Saltwort (sebalnamul) grows by the sea and is salty on its own, which is why the soy sauce is used sparingly. It is stir-fried with torn oyster mushrooms, and perilla powder and perilla oil are mixed in once the heat is off.
A curled tentacle and a white surface do not prove the thickest part of the octopus is cooked. Instead of a fixed time, this recipe relies on a thermometer and keeps the pot going until the center has held at 75°C or more for over a minute.