240 recipes. Page 10 of 10
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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.
Crown daisy is slightly bitter and oyster mushrooms are mild, and the two stay distinct on the plate. The mushrooms are torn along the grain and cooked dry in a wide pan first; the crown daisy goes in right before the heat is turned off.
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.
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.
Minari, sold in English as water parsley, smells clean and green in a way parsley and celery do not, and the scent does not survive much heat. Past 20 seconds in the pot it leaves with the steam and only the crunch remains, which is why the blanching stops there.
Cabbage cut into 1 cm strips and tossed briefly over high heat wilts at the edges while the center stays crisp and sweet. Sesame oil starts the cooking, and perilla oil plus partly crushed toasted sesame are added after the heat is off, layering two kinds of nuttiness.
Miyeokgwi, the ruffled base of the sea mustard plant (sold as mekabu in Japan), is thicker and bumpier than the leaves and bounces back when you bite it. It is dressed sweet, sour, and hot with chili flakes, soy, vinegar, and sugar, then chilled for 10 minutes before serving.
Medium dried anchovies are toasted in a dry pan for a minute before any sauce touches them, which drives off moisture and fishy smell and keeps them crunchy under the glaze. Once the anchovies are in the sauce, the coating takes under 2 minutes, and any longer sets the glaze hard.
Shepherd's purse is eaten root and all, because the earthy scent lives in the root. That also means scraping dirt off each root with the tip of a knife and washing through several changes of water. Gochujang would bury the scent; the dressing is doenjang instead. The greens are around only briefly in early spring.
The name echoes the tang-tang of the knife hitting the board as live octopus is chopped into short, chopstick-sized pieces. An egg yolk sits in the middle to be stirred in just before eating, while the sesame oil and salt dip stays on the side so each bite can be seasoned to taste. Any water left on the octopus after cleaning pools on the plate and keeps the oil from clinging, so it is patted completely dry.
Ogeurakji is North Gyeongsang dialect for dried radish shriveled and curled up, and the name covers the seasoned side dish made from it. Jocheong (grain syrup) stands in for sugar, which makes the chili dressing cling heavy and glossy, and anchovy fish sauce with soy sauce does the salting. It needs a hard kneading by hand or the seasoning just slides around. Eat it right away, or give it a day in the fridge for the red to reach the center of each strip.
Oiji are cucumbers put down in brine for a month or more in summer, when cucumbers are everywhere, and they come out with a firm, chewy crunch nothing like a fresh one. Straight from the brine they are too salty. The slices soak in cold water for about 30 minutes, though a bite of one slice tells you more than the timer.
Fine, tangled parae hides a lot of sand, and it is washed through five or more changes of water until nothing settles at the bottom of the bowl. Ten seconds in boiling water is all the cooking it gets. The gochujang, vinegar and sugar dressing goes in over two or three additions; pour it all at once and the thin strands clump.
Ground perilla seed turns into a thin, nutty coating on each strand of bracken fern. The perilla oil is split in two: half goes into the raw seasoning so the soy and garlic soak into the chewy fibers, and the other half carries the green onion's aroma in the pan.
Shiitake cut into thick slices soak up a soy and syrup glaze until the outside turns glossy brown and the inside stays chewy. The braise stops before the pan goes dry, while the sauce still coats a spoon lightly; reduced all the way, it starts to scorch. Sesame oil goes in after the heat is off, and a few minutes of cooling lets the glaze soak in further.
The king oyster mushrooms are torn by hand along the grain instead of sliced, then steamed. The soy, vinegar and chili flake dressing seeps into the torn fibers, and with no oil in the pan the mushroom stays clean-tasting.
Saeujeot, tiny salted shrimp, supplies every bit of salt in this side dish; the chili flakes, garlic, scallion, and sesame oil only round it out into something eaten a little at a time from a small bowl. Jars vary a lot in how much brine they hold, and too much liquid leaves the seasoning sliding around in a puddle. Coloring the shrimp with chili flakes first, then folding the rest in from the bottom up, keeps the little shrimp whole instead of mashed.
These are not fresh soybean leaves but leaves that have been fermented in brine, so the first job is soaking out their strong funk and excess salt before any seasoning touches them. Rather than tossed loose, they are stacked a few at a time with the fish sauce and chili dressing brushed between the layers, then packed into a container and chilled.
All of the measured salt goes into the blanching water, leaving soy sauce as the only seasoning in the dressing itself. Keeping the pot at a hard boil after the spinach goes in lets the leaves wilt within moments, and the cold water bath that follows fixes their bright green. Cut to a length that is easy to pick up with chopsticks, the spinach is finished with sesame seeds crushed lightly between the palms.
The bitterness of sseumbagui, a Korean bitter green, is not meant to be removed. A short soak in cold salt water only softens it, and the greens, still pleasantly bitter, are tossed in a sweet and tangy dressing of gochujang, vinegar and sugar.
The longer crown daisy sits in boiling water, the more of its scent it loses. About 20 seconds is enough before it moves to an ice bath. The thick base stays tough even after blanching, and two or three centimeters are cut off beforehand.
Bean sprouts go limp if they linger in water that is barely simmering. The pot needs a hard boil, and the sprouts come out the moment their stems turn translucent, under 30 seconds, straight into cold water. Green onion and sesame seeds are not tossed in but scattered over the top once the sprouts are in the bowl.
Fresh tot (hijiki) turns from brown to bright green the moment it hits boiling water, and it has a pleasant snap. It's tossed with thin slices of onion in a sour-spicy dressing of equal parts gochujang and vinegar.
Too fragile to slice, silken tofu goes onto a flat plate as a whole block with the dressing poured over the top. Out of the package, it rests briefly on a paper towel to shed surface water before moving to the plate. The dressing is soy sauce with chili flakes, garlic, green onion, and sesame oil, and the tofu is served either cold or warmed for a minute in the microwave.