779 recipes. Page 32 of 33
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Think of soft tofu stew (sundubu jjigae) made with just a cup of broth and poured straight over rice. Pork belly is cooked first so gochugaru and garlic can bloom in its fat, which gives the small amount of broth its heat. An egg cracked into the center and cooked only until the white just sets adds a soft, rich finish.
The cucumber here is cooked, but only until it is warm and glossy, never soft in the middle. Soup soy sauce and a little chili flakes are the only seasonings, giving a faint red tint with no real heat. The tofu is browned on its own and folded back in at the end.
The truffle oil goes on only after the rice has finished resting. Heat drives off its aroma, so it never cooks in the pot. The rice itself is cooked in vegetable stock with shiitake, king oyster mushroom and onion that were first sauteed in butter, and the king oyster is cut thick enough to give a real bite.
A shallow crosshatch scored on the inside of the squid body opens up as it cooks, curling each piece and letting the gochujang sauce work into the cuts. Score too deep and the body tears apart; the knife should only graze the surface.
Grilled tteokgalbi, Korean short rib patties, are cut into bites and returned to the pan with onion in a soy and syrup sauce just long enough to turn glossy. The heat goes off while a little sauce still pools in the pan, and that goes over the rice too. A soft fried egg sits on top, its yolk broken and mixed through.
Water from the bean sprouts is what most easily turns this stir-fry thin. They are drained well, added only in the last minute or two, and the whole pan goes onto a plate as soon as the heat is off.
Thin strips of burdock root, soaked briefly in vinegar water, are sauteed with onion in sesame oil before the soaked rice, carrot and chicken stock go in. The burdock's earthy aroma and faint crunch are what an ordinary chicken porridge does not have. The chicken tenderloin is added after the rice has broken down and cooks only briefly.
Jumulleok means meat kneaded by hand with its marinade, but thin duck slices tear if squeezed, so here the gochujang sauce is folded through them gently. Perilla leaves add their scent to the spicy coating.
Apple snails, diced zucchini, onion, and crumbled tofu are simmered with doenjang and gochujang into a chunky paste, then folded with warm rice into lettuce and perilla leaves. Unlike ureong doenjang jjigae, a soupy stew with the same snails, this version is reduced until a spoonful holds its shape for about five seconds and nothing drips from the leaf.
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.
Carrot gets a one-minute head start before the onion, zucchini, bell pepper and corn follow. The order goes by how long each vegetable takes to cook, not by how much water it holds. Everything is cut to about 5 mm so it spreads evenly through the rice, and the corn kernels give little bursts of sweetness.
There is no coconut milk here. Eggs and evaporated milk make the sauce, and instead of a soupy curry you get soft, moist curds clinging to the crab. The curry note comes from mild curry powder rather than paste, along with nam prik pao and Chinese celery.
Pork loin and green pepper are cut into matching thin strips so they cook together in a few minutes over high heat. Slicing the loin across the grain means even the long strips bite cleanly instead of turning chewy and stringy.
Fried chicken thighs get only a thin coat of a sour, spicy sauce made from gochujang, ketchup and vinegar, so the crust is still crisp when it reaches the table. Letting the fried chicken cool and then rewarming it in the oil makes it crunchier still.
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.
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.
Celery keeps much of its crunch and scent after a quick stir-fry, so it stays distinct among the soy and oyster sauce beef. The pan the beef came out of is not washed; the celery and onion go straight into it.
Boiled pork gets chopped fine and fried hard in butter until the edges crisp, then calamansi juice (from a small sour Philippine citrus) and mayonnaise are stirred in at the end. Any water left on the pork makes it steam before it browns, and without crisp edges this Filipino bar snack loses its point.
Thin-sliced bulgogi beef sits in a gochujang marinade for about ten minutes, then hits a hot pan with onion. By the end there is almost no liquid left, just a glossy coat of sauce clinging to every slice.
Ketchup sets a sweet base and half a spoon of gochujang adds only a mild heat, giving these cocktail sausages a sticky glaze that settles into shallow scores and sits well in a lunchbox. Once the ketchup and syrup start to thicken they stick fast to the pan, so nothing stays still after the sauce is poured in.
Square fish cake sheets are blanched for 20 seconds before frying to shed surface oil, which lets the gochujang glaze cling more cleanly. No water is added; the onion goes in first, and the moisture it gives off loosens the sauce on the pan floor.
Bulgogi-style beef marinated in soy sauce and pear juice gets ssamchu, a leafy cabbage, at the very end, stems first and leaves a minute later. That split leaves crunchy stems next to leaves that have only just wilted, and any longer in the pan would drain the greens of their sweetness and moisture.
Doenjang (Korean fermented soybean paste) does most of the seasoning, with only a little gochujang, so the pork comes out savory and salty rather than hot. The crown daisy goes in after the meat is cooked and comes off the heat just as the leaves wilt, keeping its slightly bitter scent.
The bean sprouts are not pulled after 30 seconds but cooked through, which makes this a soft stir-fry rather than a crunchy one. The oyster mushrooms are torn along the grain instead of cut, and the seasoning is soup soy sauce and salt.