99 recipes. Page 1 of 5
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Perilla powder goes in last, after the boiled napa cabbage has been dressed with doenjang. It soaks up the water left on the leaves, so the seasoning clings to each strand instead of pooling in the bowl. One tablespoon is enough; more turns the dish pasty.
The silken tofu here stays in big, soft spoonfuls instead of dissolving into the rice. It goes in only once the porridge is done and is barely stirred after that. The rice and shiitake are first toasted in perilla oil, then simmered in kelp stock.
Thin-sliced beef brisket goes into a dry pan first, and the fat it renders cooks the garlic, onion and zucchini. If the brisket gives off plenty, the cooking oil can be cut back. It is a side for rice, or spooned over a hot bowl of it as a quick rice bowl.
A sauce of yuja cheong (Korean citron marmalade) and soy sauce, brushed into the gills of fresh shiitake caps and left for ten minutes, seeps between the folds and stays on after grilling as a sour-salty glaze.
Cheonggak, a green seaweed that grows in many-forked branches, is sold packed in salt. A cold-water soak takes the salt out, and a short simmer keeps it crunchy even in hot broth. It cooks with tofu, seasoned with tuna extract and Korean soup soy sauce.
Okara, the soybean pulp, drinks up the broth and cooks down almost to the thickness of porridge. Pork and sour kimchi are fried in perilla oil first, and salted shrimp seasons the pot at the end. Okara sinks and catches on the bottom; through the 20-plus minutes of gentle simmering, the pot needs frequent scraping.
Finely chopped salted shrimp loosened in water seasons this zucchini side dish instead of soy sauce, a habit handed down from country tables where salted shrimp was the main seasoning. Cooking it covered over medium-low heat lands somewhere between steaming and braising, and the zucchini softens without going mushy.
Instead of a soup, ground perilla seed, perilla oil, and soup soy sauce form a thick, nutty sauce that clings to fine somyeon noodles. Chwinamul, a Korean wild aster green, brings a distinctive mountain-herb scent that the toasted perilla balances. The greens are blanched only briefly and shocked in cold water, so they stay deep green with some bite. Spring chwinamul has the strongest aroma.
Boiled potato gnocchi get a second cooking in pancetta fat, browning on the bottom while staying soft inside. A splash of chicken stock reduced with Parmigiano makes just enough sauce to coat each piece thinly. Perilla oil, a nutty Korean oil pressed from perilla seeds, is poured in only after the heat is off so its aroma survives, and shredded perilla leaves from the same plant echo it on top.
Eaten raw, chamnamul (a Korean mountain herb) gives off a fresh aroma somewhere between parsley and celery. Pan-fried cubes of firm tofu, golden and crisp outside, give it something to chew on, julienned Asian pear adds cool sweetness, and halved cherry tomatoes bring a little acidity. Whether the tofu forms a firm crust depends on moisture: pressed poorly, it sticks to the pan and never firms up. The cubes are folded in last, after the greens are dressed, once they have cooled completely and can hold their shape. The pear is cut right before assembly to limit browning, and the dressing is just perilla oil, lemon juice, and soup soy sauce, kept simple so the nutty perilla oil leads.
Amaranth greens, their tough stem ends snapped off one by one with the fingers, are blanched for under a minute, squeezed hard and dressed with doenjang, soup soy sauce and perilla oil.
Perilla oil and kkaennip (perilla leaves) both come from the same plant, so one bowl carries the toasty smell of the seed and the fresh, minty smell of the leaf. The egg is cooked soft in butter and folded in.
Ground perilla seeds thicken the small amount of cooking liquid into a light, nutty sauce, so the cabbage ends up sitting in a shallow gravy rather than dry or watery. Stems and leaves are cut together, yet a short covered cook leaves the stems with some crunch while the leaves turn soft.
Songhwa mushrooms get a thin coat of perilla oil and soy sauce, then a sprinkle of ground perilla seed just before the heat goes off, layering the same nutty aroma twice. Their caps are thick, and generous slices hold together in the pan.
The ingredients are nearly those of kimchi stew, but with more water, so it becomes a soup for pouring over hot rice. How it tastes depends on how sour the kimchi is; if yours is still young, a little vinegar fills the gap.
Eggplant cut into wide bias slices drinks up the gochujang broth and releases a mouthful of spicy liquid with each bite. The chili paste and flakes need only about 30 seconds over low heat and scorch if left longer.
Gondre, a soft mountain thistle green, soaks up seasoning readily, and steamed with ground perilla seed and perilla oil it turns deeply nutty. It is kept a little moist and often spooned over rice and mixed in.
Perilla oil smells nuttier and more grassy than sesame oil, and in this cold somyeon dish it is the main flavor, with only soy sauce, a little sugar, and garlic underneath. Crumbled roasted seaweed goes on just before eating so it stays crisp, and toasted sesame seeds add a small crunch. With almost no cooking beyond boiling the noodles, it makes a quick late-night meal.
Napa cabbage seared hard on its cut sides turns smoky-sweet on the surface while the core stays crisp. Gamtae, a fine, hair-like Korean seaweed sold in dried sheets, is crumbled over the warm wedges for a delicate ocean aroma, and the salad is best eaten while the cabbage is still warm and the seaweed still crackles.
Salt, perilla oil and garlic season this chamchwi; there is no soy sauce or doenjang, and the herb's own aroma leads. The greens are turned in boiling water for about a minute and lifted out when the leaves brighten and the stems just start to bend.
Cleaned blue crab sits on the rice, which cooks in anchovy-kelp stock with doenjang dissolved in it, and the crab's sweetness and the earthy paste soak down into every grain. After the rice has rested, one more minute over low heat builds a layer of nurungji (scorched rice) on the bottom. Doenjang varies in saltiness from brand to brand, so start with a tablespoon and taste the stock.
With nothing but napa cabbage, doenjang, garlic, perilla oil and sesame seeds, the cabbage's own sweetness comes through. Take it off the heat while the thick ribs still have a little crunch.
Onion rings cut 2 cm thick are pinned through the side with toothpicks, and the layers stay together when turned. Doenjang (fermented soybean paste), gochujang, perilla oil and garlic are loosened with two tablespoons of water into a brushable sauce, which goes on thinly from the first flip onward.
Napa cabbage lines the bottom of the pot, and kimchi, blanched beef, tofu, enoki and frozen dumplings are arranged around it in separate blocks of color before anchovy stock with gochujang is poured over. A drop of perilla oil goes on just before it reaches the table.