262 recipes. Page 8 of 11
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Thin slices of cold white fish sashimi tangle with chewy naengmyeon noodles in a sweet, sour and spicy gochujang dressing. The noodles cook in only 30 to 40 seconds, so they come out the moment the strands loosen; any longer and the chew is gone.
A mustard dressing gives these sprouts a nose-tingling heat, softened by the sweet tartness of vinegar and sugar. Mustard mixed ahead of time develops a sharper pungency. Unlike the usual seasoned bean sprouts, this one is always served cold, and the chill makes both the mustard and the crunch more pronounced. Overcooked sprouts go soft and lose the snap the dish depends on. Because cucumber and carrot carry a lot of water, the cucumber is salted and pressed first to keep the sauce from going thin. Set beside fatty mains like samgyeopsal or bulgogi, it clears the palate.
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.
Pepper leaves, the tender greens picked from chili plants, have almost none of the fruit's heat; what they offer instead is a fresh, grassy flavor with a faint bitterness. Packed in a soy, vinegar and sugar brine with garlic and a Cheongyang chili, they become a summer side dish that needs 3 days of refrigeration before it is ready. Lay a single leaf over a spoonful of rice and fold it like a small wrap.
A big platter piled with somyeon, shredded cabbage, cucumber, carrot and torn lettuce arrives tossed in a spicy-tangy gochujang dressing. Each vegetable brings its own kind of crunch against the soft noodles, and the dressing of gochujang, vinegar, sugar and soy hits sweet, sour and hot in quick succession. Sesame oil and toasted seeds round off the sharpness without dulling it.
Chewy-crunchy slices of pig's ear, crisp bean sprouts and cucumber get coated in a thick dressing of peanut butter, white miso and vinegar. Despite the word sashimi in the name, nothing is raw: the term refers to the vinegared dressing, and the ears are bought precooked and sliced.
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.
Broad, thick gomchwi leaves soak up the soy brine evenly and are seasoned through after just 2 days of chilling. The leaf's bold, wild mountain-herb scent blends with the soy, and vinegar trims the finish so the pickle never feels heavy. Only the thick stems are blanched, for 20 seconds, which softens them while the leaves stay fresh. Excess water is pressed out leaf by leaf, since wringing tears the leaves and drains their scent. Wrap a leaf around a spoonful of rice to eat it like ssam, a Korean lettuce wrap.
Thick, springy jjolmyeon noodles get tossed in a sweet, sour and spicy dressing of gochujang, vinegar and sugar. Cabbage and cucumber soaked in cold water stay crisp against the heat, while a halved boiled egg rounds things out. The noodle is said to have started in the 1970s as a production mistake at a noodle factory in Incheon.
Chewy seaweed stems meet crisp julienned apple, and a mustard dressing adds a sinus-tingling heat. Salted seaweed stems need a proper soak: if too much salt remains, the apple's sweetness disappears, and if they are blanched too long, they lose their snappy bite. Vinegar and oligosaccharide syrup, a mild Korean sweetener, round the mustard into something sweet and sharp. The salad is served cold.
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.
Bracken fern, usually served as a seasoned namul, goes into a sweet-sour soy brine in this recipe, and its boiled stems stay springy and chewy with a nutty flavor that builds as you chew. Vinegar clears away the fern's earthy smell for a clean finish, while dried chili and garlic add a gentle warmth. Once cooled, the jar rests refrigerated for about 2 days before eating.
Juice from well-fermented kimchi, stretched with water and balanced with sugar and vinegar, becomes a chilled sweet-sour broth for thin somen. Since nearly all the flavor comes from the kimchi, young kimchi leaves the broth flat and short on tang. Chopped kimchi and cucumber strips on top add crunch to a light summer bowl.
Unlike kimchi, mu-saengchae skips fermentation: the julienned radish is dressed and eaten the same day, with its crunch intact. Ten minutes under coarse salt pulls water from the strips so the chili-flake dressing clings instead of sliding off. Anchovy fish sauce lays a savory base under the radish's clean, mild flavor. Fresh from the bowl it snaps; after a night in the fridge it softens into a lightly pickled side with a different character. It is a standard partner for fatty dishes like samgyeopsal or braised short ribs.
Fresh corn cut off the cob, lima beans, zucchini and tomato warm through together in one pan, and the vinegar and basil are added after the heat is off for a sharp, herbal finish. The recipe uses cooked canned lima beans, and dried or raw ones would not soften in the same few minutes.
Dried celtuce stems, soaked until they bend but keep a firm bite, give this soy pickle its springy chew. The 300 g in the ingredient list is the soaked and drained weight. Soaking that much dry gungchae would swell far beyond what the brine can cover. Plain dried stems are the right buy, because fresh wosun stalks and pre-seasoned jars behave differently. Garlic and dried chilies steep in the hot soy, vinegar, and sugar brine, adding a mild warmth behind the sweet-salty taste. Rather than waiting for the hot jar to cool on the counter, split it into shallow containers and chill it right away, and the flavor starts to come through after a day.
Chilled buckwheat noodles get tossed with fine shreds of cucumber, red cabbage, and carrot that outweigh the noodles, and the result eats more like a salad than a noodle bowl. The dressing is gochujang thinned with vinegar, soy sauce, and a little sesame oil: spicy, sour, and savory at once. Rubbing the cooked noodles under cold water strips their surface starch, which keeps them from clumping and stops the dressing from pooling at the bottom of the bowl. The toss happens right before serving and the bowl spends only 5 minutes in the fridge, because buckwheat softens quickly once dressed. It makes a light meal on a hot day.
Slicing cooked octopus thin and wide with the knife laid at a low angle shortens its tough fibers, so each piece chews easily. Cho-gochujang, gochujang sharpened with vinegar and sugar, coats it in a sour heat, while minari (Korean water dropwort) adds a fresh, herbal aroma and cucumber and onion bring crunch.
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.
Bamboo shoots have a tight, dense grain that drinks in the soy, vinegar and sugar brine slowly yet stays crisp, and by the third day of chilling the seasoning reaches the center. A bay leaf and whole peppercorns give the plain soy pickle a quiet spice note; the bay leaf comes out as soon as the brine boils so it does not take over. Raw shoots carry a bitterness the brine cannot hide. Next to fatty pork belly or galbi, the sharp, salty pieces cut the richness between bites.
Equal measures of soy sauce and vinegar give this Gangwon-style dressing its sour edge, with gochugaru for heat and a little sugar to round it off. Finely chopped kimchi clings to the noodles instead of sitting in clumps, adding fermented tang and crunch to every bite. With little gluten to hold them together, buckwheat noodles snap apart when boiled past the package time or pressed down while mixing. The dressing is folded in by lifting from below. Several rinses in cold water wash off the surface starch that would make the strands stick together. Water left on the rinsed noodles thins the dressing fast, which makes thorough draining as important as the chill.
Cold slices of pork trotter are topped with jellyfish, cucumber and carrot and dressed with a mustard and vinegar sauce sharp enough to sting the nose. Chilling the sauce ahead of time makes it all the more refreshing.
Most soy pickles take their brine boiling hot, but in this recipe the boiled brine cools completely before it touches the perilla leaves, which would otherwise blacken and go limp. Sliced garlic and a cheongyang chile are tucked between the leaves raw rather than simmered in the brine, which keeps their bite sharp against the herbal perilla. From day three, a single leaf wrapped around a spoonful of rice is the usual way to eat it. It stays in the fridge, and this mix is not meant to be kept beyond a month.
Pan-fried mackerel and stir-fried mukeunji, kimchi aged until deeply sour, turn a bowl of spicy mixed noodles into something closer to a full meal. Salting the fish and blotting away the liquid it releases keeps the fishy smell down.