Spicy Korean Tofu with Pear Slaw for #Food of the World

For this month's #Food of the World event, we are going to South Korea. The town we live in has a large Korean population in fact one of our next door neighbors are Korean. We have a very big Korean grocery store in town (actually that is the only store we have in town) and they have pretty much everything you need to make a Korean dish at home.

For today, I actually wanted to make another dish and bought the ingredients too. It was a cold noodle dish and the noodles I bought completely clumped up after boiling. Not sure what went wrong and then I had to change plans and make this tofu.

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Korean Vegetarian Joomuk Bap (Korean Style Rice & Veggie Fist Balls)

To go with the Korean Miso Soup, I made these Korean style Rice & Veggie Fist balls called Joomuk Bap. I landed on this recipe while I was looking for Korean recipes and really liked everything that went into this dish. My broccoli loving daughter really liked these rice balls.

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Korea -- Miso Soup & Joomuk Bap (Vegetarian/ Vegan Recipes)

BM# 44: A-Z Cooking Series -- Around the World in 30 days
Country: K for Korea

Dish: Korean Miso Soup & Joomuk Bap
We are staying in Asia and visiting Korea today. I knew from day 1 that I would be doing Korea for K, since I live in a town that has a very high Korean population. We have a Korean grocery store in town and most of the stores have signs in Korean.
I hardly cook Korean food at home even though I have full access to all the Korean veggies, spices and other ingredients. I don't have much knowledge of Korean cuisine and I thought this is a good opportunity to give some Korean dishes a try.
I was under the impression that all of the Korean dishes have meat in them. But there are a lot of Korean dishes that are actually vegan. Buddhist temple food is completely vegetarian and/ or vegan. I found an amazing Vegan Korean blog called Vegan 8 Korean and they have some awesome Korean dishes. I have tried a few Korean dishes already, check those out here.

I made Korean Miso Soup that uses Korean Miso paste called Doenjang. But a good substitute would be red or brown miso paste. I found quite a few recipes that used anchovies and fish sauce, but I skipped them and used some vegetarian options instead. Most of the ingredients were bought specially for this recipe.

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Kimchi Pancakes (Kimchijeon) -- Vegan recipe

Blogging Marathon# 38: Week 3/ Day 1
Theme: One Dish, Different Countries
Dish: Korea -- Kimchi Pancakes

Being a food blogger, I am always looking for new dishes to make. I rarely repeat or make the same dish again unless it is an everyday dish that the family is used to. My husband was saying the other day I cook for the blog and not for them. Mmmmm, I think I'm guilty of doing that, but I don't usually comment when he says that because I need my taste-testers happy and not grumpy.

Talking about new dishes, when I made this Kimchi -- I wasn't actually sure what to use it in. Then I found Kimchi fried rice recipe which I really liked. But as I said before, repeating dishes is something that happens very rarely, I looked for something else to make with kimchi and I found these Kimchi pancakes on the Kitchn and they seemed simple and easy to make with just a few ingredients.

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Vegetarian Kimchi Fried Rice (Kimchi Bokkeumbap)

Blogging Marathon# 37: Week 3/ Day 1

Theme: Street Food from Around the World

Dish: Kimchi Fried Rice from Korea

My theme for this week's Blogging marathon got me very very excited. It is Street Food from around the world. Learning about the different dishes that are served as street food from various countries was very interesting and there are so many dishes that I wanted to make at home. But since we are posting for only 3 days, I had to narrow down my search to 3 dishes. Hopefully I can make the rest of my bookmarked dishes some time soon.
For the first day, I made Korean street food -- Kimchi Fried rice.From what I've read online, Koreans make fried rice with overripe kimchi that needs to be used up. I personally love fried rice because it s a great use of leftover rice and there are infinite variations to come up with.

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Vegan Kimchi with Ginger & Chiles

New Jersey is one state where you find large Indian population. In some towns it almost feels like Americans are in minority there. Most of the apartment complexes are filled with Indians and streets are filled with Indian stores, restaurants, beauty parlors, these towns look like mini Indias. 

But the town we live in has a majority of Koreans. Most of the stores are run by Koreans and stores have a lot of Korean vegetables and ingredients. Being around so many Koreans, I have always wanted to try Kimchi. It is a tradional fermented side dish made of vegetables and variety of seasoning. It tastes spicy and sour. Kimchi is Korea's national dish and is used to make other dishes like kimchi fried rice, kimchi pancakes, kimchi stew etc.

Our local Korean store has a whole Kimchi section. It's around the corner where fresh seafood is sold, so I never actually saw this side of the store in detail. When I decided to make kimchi and went to the store to get the ingredients, I took a few pictures to share with you guys.

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Vegetarian Bi Bim Bap

Do you ever think of this one dish that you had years ago that was so good that you can’t forget it, but at the same time cannot figure out what it actually is. That happened to me during my China trip almost 3 years ago.

My Chinese colleague Chris took me to this basement restaurant in Shanghai and the place was kind of smoky, but packed with people for lunch. There were a number of counters with different cuisine being cooked at each counter, like Chinese, Korean, and Japanese etc. My colleague seated me at a table (with couple of strangers already having their lunch) and went to order food. She came back with this hot (and heavy) stone bowl with some rice, veggies and egg in it. I don’t remember anymore details about the dish, but I do remember saying that it was really really good (I had a strange feeling that it was not vegetarian, but I trusted Chris).

The rice was crunchy in the bottom and once the veggies and egg got mixed with the spice mixture on the top, there was an explosion of flavors in the mouth. That’s what I remembered, explosion of flavors, but never was able to know what it was. Until PJ announced A.W.E.D-Korean and I started to look around for recipes, that’s when I found Dolsot Bi Bim Bap from Susan’s Fat free Vegan blog. A.W.E.D is a monthly event started by DK @ Culinary Bazaar.

I bought gochu jang from the Korean market that I already used in Japchae before. You might get away without using it in Japchae, but you really need it in this dish, that is the ingredient that creates the explosion. This recipe is a combination of 2-3 recipes and I cannot vouch for the authenticity of it, but DH and I really enjoyed the dish. The dish requires quite a bit of prep work, so plan accordingly.

Ingredients:

Rice – 1 cup

Chinese Broccoli (Spinach) – 1 small bunch, chopped

Zucchini – 2 medium, peeled and chopped

Broccoli – 1 small bunch, chopped into florets

Bean sprouts – 1 cup, washed

Carrot – 1 small, thinly sliced

Eggs - 4

Soy sauce – to taste

Sesame oil – to taste

Salt & pepper – to taste

For the Spicy sauce:

Gochu jang – 2 tbsp

Sugar – 2 tsp

Sesame oil – 1tsp

Method:

• Mix all the sauce ingredients with little water to get a pourable sauce.
• Cook rice and keep aside.
• In a large sauté pan, add 1tsp peanut oil and sauté Chinese broccoli until just wilted. Season with soy sauce, sesame oil, salt and pepper (S+S+S+P). Remove onto a plate.
• In the same pan, sauté zucchini till tender; season with S+S+S+P. Remove onto a plate.
  
• Boil 5-6 cups water in a sauce pan; add the sprouts and boil for 2 minutes. Completely drain water; season with S+S+S+P, keep aside. Steam broccoli and season with S… (you get the idea, just steam/saute/boil any veggie and season with S+S+S+P and keep aside).
  
• In the meantime, make an omelet and keep aside.
• When ready to serve, place some rice in the bottom of the serving bowl, add all the toppings so they cascade down from the center. Also make sure that same colored toppings are not put next to each other. Then put a dollop of spicy sauce and your omelet. To eat, mix everything together and enjoy the burst of flavors.
  

Vegetarian Jap Chae

This is my entry to A.W.E.D – Korea, being guest hosted by PJ @ Seduce your Taste buds. A.W.E.D (A World Epicurean Delight) is the brain child of talented DK @ Culinary Bazaar. I am lucky to have a very good Korean market not too far from us that we visit at least once a month for the fresh produce and good deals on tofu and fruit.

During my recent visit I bought some gochujang, Korean hot pepper paste to try. I already had half a package of sweet potato noodles, dang myun, that I had bought a while back. Jap Chae is stir-fried noodles with vegetables and meat. Here’s my recipe for Jap Chae.

Ingredients:

Sweet Potato Noodles – 2 bunches

Peppers – 2, I used 1 red & ½ green

Onion – 1 large, thinly sliced

Mushrooms – 1 cup, chopped

Carrots – 1 medium, chopped into matchsticks

Chinese Broccoli – ½ cup, chopped (you can use spinach)

Garlic – 2 cloves, minced

Gochujang – 2 tsp

Soy sauce – 4tbsp (I use low-sodium)

Rice Vinegar – 2tsp

Sesame Oil – 1tbsp

Sugar – 2tsp

Salt & pepper – to taste

Eggs – 3

Method:

• Cook noodles according to package directions and set aside. Sweet potato noodles are very long and hard to handle, so when cool enough to handle, cut noodles into 6" pieces.
  
• Heat a large sauté pan on medium high heat; add 1tbsp peanut oil, when hot and sizzling, add garlic and stir fry for 30 seconds or until lightly browned and fragrant (not burnt). Add onions, carrots and peppers; sauté for 3-4 minutes. Add mushrooms and Chinese broccoli and sauté until all the veggies are crisp but tender, another 4-5 minutes.
  
• Add gochu jang, soy sauce, rice vinegar, salt, pepper and sugar. Cook for couple of minutes. Add cooked noodles and stir fry for 2 minutes. Check the seasonings and adjust accordingly.
  
• In the meantime, make an omelet with the eggs, cut them into strips and serve them over the stir fried noodles.