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.

I wasn't really sure how this dish will be received by the family, so I made only a small quantity. I gave a spoonful to my daughter and she slurped it up. But my son turned his nose up when he tasted. So my daughter and I relished this for dinner. I also made Korean style Rice & veggie balls called Joomuk Bap (Fist Rice) to go along with the soup.

 Recipe adapted from here.
Korean Miso Soup
Ingredients: Serves 2
Vegetable Stock - 3cups
Kelp - 2 pieces
Onion - ¼ of a small onion
Garlic - 2 cloves, crushed
Cucumber - ½ of a small one
Tofu - ½cup, chopped
Bok Choy/ Spinach - 1 cup, chopped
Scallions - 2, cut into 1" pieces
Miso paste/ Doenjang - 1tbsp
Salt & Pepper - to taste

Method:

• In a medium sauce pot, combine stock, kelp, onion, garlic, cucumber and 1 cup of water. Bring the mixture to a boil and simmer for 5~6 minutes.
• Add the chopped bok choy/ spinach and scallions. Cook for another 2~3 minutes.
• Take the miso in a small bowl and add 2~3tbsp of the boiling stock. Mix well to combine thoroughly.
• Add the miso paste to the boiling soup. Mix well to combine, season with salt and pepper. Turn off the heat and serve hot with Joomuk Bap (Fist Balls).

Check out the Blogging Marathon page for the other Blogging Marathoners doing BM# 44.

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