Three years and one moving truck later, I finally graduated from law school! I celebrated by getting in a car with a few friends, new and not so new, and heading straight for Palm Springs.
Would you like a bite of plastic food?
Cocktails at Ace Hotel
Joshua Tree
The End.
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Last in this week's impromptu banchan series is ggakdugi (Gahk-doo-ghee), a type of kimchi made with Korean white radish (moo). Ggakdugi is simple to make, making it a good choice for beginners. In fact, this was my first kimchi attempt, and I can say it's much less intimidating than it sounds.
I began with recipes from both Eating and Living and Maangchi and ended up with my own adaptation below. According to my mom, you don't need rice powder, which helps thicken the sauce. Also, although fermented shrimp is often used in making kimchi, I followed Maangchi's suggestion and used fish sauce instead, just to see if the result would be noticeably different. After three days of fermenting at room temperature in my kitchen, the ggakdugi tasted perfect, just like my mom's. I'll definitely keep this recipe around; next time, I'll use saewootjeot (fermented shrimp) instead of fish sauce.
Ggakdugi (Radish Kimchi)
Adapted from Eating and Living and Maangchi
Ingredients
How-To:
Eat right away if you like, or let the ggakdugi sit at room temperature for 1-3 days to let it ferment. You will know fermentation has occurred when you open the container and see bubbles (it's alive!). At that point, stick the ggakdugi in the fridge. It will continue to ferment, and you'll notice how the flavor changes over the course of a few weeks.
In part two of this week's banchan series, I present to you sukjunamul (sook-joo-nah-muhl), aka mung bean sprouts. This is a banchan you see all the time at restaurants, whether as a side dish or as an ingredient in bibimbap.
And it's dead simple to make. Boil the mung bean sprouts, drain the excess water, and toss with a few ingredients to make the mild, nutty flavor of the sprouts shine.
This time, I used a recipe from Maangchi, Internet Queen of Korean cooking. The last time I checked, she was in her fifties, though she doesn't look a day over forty. Check out her recipe page for both written instructions and a video. You can see I adapted her recipe by using only sprouts and leaving out the cucumber.
P.S. I can see by my photos that I need to go shop for new props.
P.P.S. My new favorite food? Raw, young mung bean sprouts, barely cracked.
Many of you are already familiar with banchan—the little dishes of food that you can find on any Korean table, whether in a home or at a restaurant. Some people describe banchan as side dishes, though they are an essential part of any Korean dining experience. Having many different kinds of banchan means every person at the table can customize every bite of his or her meal. And in a pinch, rice and banchan make a perfectly acceptable meal.
Although Korean food is ubiquitous in Los Angeles, I'm interested in making my own. Take banchan. You can make a lot of it and eat it for days or weeks (months, in the case of kimchi). And honestly, some of these dishes are so easy to prepare that you can make several in one go. The other day, I made three types of banchan in under two hours, counting waiting time.
The one pictured above is oi muchim (oh-ee moo-cheem, "oi" meaning "cucumber" in Korean). I like to eat oi muchim on hot summer days, though I'll eat it any time with a bit of rice. Despite my rough English translation, oi muchim is not very spicy and tastes more like a quick pickle with a peppery kick. Make a lot, and keep it in the fridge. But don't wait too long to eat it; oi muchim isn't meant to ferment like kimchi. Like most banchan, serve oi muchim in a small dish, and sprinkle sesame seeds on top. Everyone eats from the same banchan dish, though there's no rule against giving everyone his or her own.
I tried the recipe from Eating and Living, one of my favorite Korean food blogs. It came out great. A tad salty, but good. Give it a shot! My only tip is to make sure to use quality cucumbers. Korean cucumbers or Kirby pickling cucumbers are ideal. The worst are the flabby, flavorless ones you find at your standard grocery store.
Cocktail purists and experts, read no further. What follows may cause your skin to erupt in red, itchy spots.
My knowledge about spirits is next to nil, but I've reached a time in my life when I can imagine a weekend night in with just me, the radio, and a cocktail.
First, what's a true Old Fashioned? Secondhand information suggests this American invention originally called for a combination of spirits, sugar, bitters, and water. Over time, spirits came to mean American whiskey, typically rye (mainly rye) or bourbon (mainly corn). (By the way, today I heard Peggy Noe Stevens of Bourbon Women say on Good Food that more than 95% of the world's bourbon is produced in Kentucky.)
That's the original. Now here's my twist. First, I used a scotch whiskey (whiskey made in Scotland) that is probably best sipped neat and not in a cocktail. It's what I had, and this being my first homemade cocktail, I wasn't ready to go out and buy an entire bottle of American whiskey for the sake of tradition. Second, I added the juice of the Golden Nugget mandarin. Purists challenge the presence of citrus in an Old Fashioned, but people who, like me, are new to whiskey, citrus is a welcome buffer.
This is one of the easiest cocktails to make, so give it a try. I might need one tonight as a study break.
Old Fashioned with Mandarin
Adapted from Chow.com
Ingredients:
2 wedges mandarin (or orange)
1 tsp. sugar
2 dashes angostura bitters
1 tsp. water
2 oz. whiskey (rye or bourbon, though scotch whiskey worked for me)
Ice
How-To:
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I'm a full-time law student who loves all things food. If you're a food nerd with a busy day job, you've come to the right place. Thanks for visiting!
- Sarah
