689 recipes. Page 9 of 29
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Tteokbokki and sundae (Korean blood sausage) are the usual pair at a Korean snack shop, and here they share one pan. The rice cakes simmer in gochujang sauce first; the sundae goes in when only a little sauce is left and gets just a few gentle turns. Stir it too long and the casing splits.
A dried magnolia leaf serves as the plate: Hida-style miso is spread on it with sliced leek and shiitake and warmed over low heat until it bubbles. The leeks lose their sharpness and the mushrooms soften in the salty miso, which is eaten a little at a time over rice or alongside drinks. The leaf itself is only a cooking surface and stays on the plate.
The puffer fish must be a pre-cleaned product approved for eating. It cooks in a broth where radish and garlic have already boiled for ten minutes, seasoned with salt and no chili, and the seasoning is right when the radish's sweetness comes through before the salt.
Blanched radish greens, rather than dried siraegi, sit in a broth made thick and nutty with four tablespoons of perilla seed powder. The shrimp are added well after the greens, which need about ten minutes to soften; shrimp left in that long turn firm instead of springy.
The tofu is cut into thick slices and pan-fried golden before it goes into the doenjang broth. That browned surface lets it take constant ladlings of sauce without falling apart, and it turns a deeper brown as the doenjang soaks in.
Bittersweet spring aralia shoots sit on top of a doenjang broth thickened by potato and zucchini. The dish belongs to early spring, the short window when the shoots are in season. Pressing the doenjang through a sieve with a ladle keeps lumps out and the broth clean. As the potato simmers it partly breaks down, giving the soup body and a mild sweetness that sits well with the fermented soybean paste, and chewy knife-cut noodles stand up to that density. The shoots are blanched on their own and added near the end, because long simmering dulls the very fragrance the dish is built around.
Kakuni falls apart along the grain at the touch of a chopstick, the result of thick pork belly cooked in soy sauce, mirin, and ginger over the lowest heat until even the fat layer turns translucent. Chilling it overnight and lifting off the set fat before reheating gives a cleaner broth, and a dab of hot Japanese mustard goes on the side.
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.
The short ribs marinate for over an hour in soy sauce with grated Asian pear and onion, then braise over low heat for another hour or more. When the meat slides off the bone at a touch of the chopsticks and the sauce has turned glossy, it all goes over rice. It is a long cook, but the pot does most of the work.
Balloon flower root has a sharp, bitter edge, so the torn strands are rubbed hard with salt and rinsed twice before they meet the pan. The sauce is gochujang sweetened with oligosaccharide syrup and sharpened with chili flakes, cooked only until it clings to each strand in a thin, glossy layer. Brief cooking keeps a firm bite in the root.
Wrapped around a wooden skewer rather than served as a free-standing patty, this tteokgalbi mixture needs far more grip than the plated kind. A little starch and more than 3 minutes of kneading give it that, and skewers soaked in water for 10 minutes scorch less. Tteokbokki sauce or ketchup alongside makes it a street-stall snack.
Webfoot octopus has a smaller body and thicker legs than nakji, the long-arm octopus. It spends just 10 minutes in the spicy marinade and 3 to 4 minutes over high heat, and the slightly charred sauce that catches on the pan floor is part of the flavor. In spring they often come full of roe, and the leftover sauce goes into fried rice.
Rice-rinsing water gives this doenjang broth a faint starchy body and takes the edge off the paste's saltiness. Spring cabbage (bomdong) supplies the sweetness at the center of the bowl. Its stems should keep a little bite, while the leaves only need to wilt.
The pork back ribs simmer on their own for 25 minutes, until the meat pulls easily off the bone, before the potatoes and seasoning go in. The perilla leaves are laid on top in large pieces at the very end; cooked too long, they turn astringent instead of fragrant.
Long simmering turns the cartilage and tendons of beef knee translucent and soft, and the broth becomes rich enough to set like aspic once it cools. A hard boil clouds the broth, so most of the craft lies in holding the pot at a gentle bubble. In Korea it is mostly a winter dish.
Freshwater fish simmered into a broth gives this noodle soup its savory base, and doenjang plus gochugaru keep any fishy edge in check while adding heat. Straining the stock two or three times through a fine sieve is what separates a clean, drinkable broth from a murky one.
Four fist-sized pork meatballs sit on a bed of napa cabbage and braise slowly in a light soy broth, staying moist and soft right to the surface instead of carrying a fried crust. The cabbage keeps the pork off the hot pot bottom and turns silky as it soaks up the meat juices.
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.
Chicken thigh glazed in gochujang goes over rice, with mayonnaise piped across it in zigzags. Thigh stays moist through the glazing where breast would dry out.
Tofu is blanched in salted water for 3 minutes and cut into thick slabs, and sour aged kimchi is stir-fried with pork shoulder and onion to go alongside. The blanching firms the tofu's surface so the thick slices are easy to pick up, and a spoonful of the hot kimchi on top seasons the outside. When it is served with soju or makgeolli, the tofu and the stir-fry go on separate plates.
Busan-style kkomjangeo, or hagfish, is cooked fast over high heat. Leave it too long in the marinade or the pan and it weeps water and loses its springy chew. The scallions go in just long enough to wilt.
Buckwheat dough rolled between the palms into thin strands shaped like little loach fish cooks gently in a dashi full of vegetables. Bound with egg and hot water, the dough should be as soft as an earlobe without sticking badly to the hands. Burdock, carrot, kabocha, napa cabbage, shiitake and chikuwa fish cake share the pot, which holds far more than a plain flour-dumpling soup.
A tablespoon of doenjang is stirred into the red chili broth to tame the fishiness. The frozen pollock is thawed only partly, just enough for a knife to get through the bone, and cut while still firm; fully thawed, the flesh crumbles.
Knee cartilage and tendon should come out chewy and springy. Cooked too long, they slump and start to melt. Slices about 0.7cm thick sit on blanched garlic chives with a ladle of warm broth poured around them, so it eats like a moist meat platter rather than a soup.