Banchan (반찬) - Korean side dish: Garlic Sesame Sprouts (숙주나물 무침)

When I first came to Korea, I wasn't a huge fan of sprouts, but over time, they have grown on my in a huge way.  I'm very happy about this because sprouts are very healthy [citation needed].

I decided to try a Korean banchan recipe.  It's fairly typical for Koreans to make large portions and keep whatever's leftover in the fridge to serve as a healthy snack ... which I've done today.  I found the recipe online somewhere.

To the uninitiated, they may not look super delicious.  To them I say: trust me.

First, I rinsed the sprouts.  I bought 380g for only a few thousand won, pretty cheap by any standard.  I had to remove a few bad ones, but mostly it was easy with no dirt or bugs.  Then I blanched the sprouts in boiling water for about 1 minute.  This part is the hardest because you want them to be only very slightly soft.  I think I may have blanched them for too long.Next I rinsed them and added a sauce.

For the sauce I used:

1 finely chopped spring onion (though "finely" is vague for me.  i'm a bit lazy with chopping sometimes)
1-2 tablespoons of minced garlic.  the recipe called for less but we love garlic!
1 tsp seasame seeds (again i added more because i didn't have fresh seeds, so the taste isn't as strong)
1 tbsp sesame oil

(Also, the recipe called for salt.  I didn't add any, but I should've added a bit)

Combine the rinsed sprouts with the sauce and eat!  Or, stick it in the fridge for later.

A few thoughts.  I didn't use exactly the right kind of onion.  This is partly laziness, because I'm pretty sure the supermarket carries the right kind but they seemed to be out of stock.  The onions I used are more like chives.  It's still tasty (with big herby flavor), but it's a bit less traditional.  Also, salt.  Just a pinch would improve them.  Finally, I overcooked the sprouts.  It was only slightly, maybe 30 seconds or so, but it was too long.  They're not soft and slimy, but they would benefit from a more careful eye on the big pot!

I would recommend this recipe and I'm sure the bulk of these will end up in bibimbap later this week!

First creation: Fried kimchi and onions!

Welcome to my food blog!  Rather than just post photos to my facebook feed, I decided to make it a food blog.  I'll post recipes, ingredients, and thoughts.

Kimchi surprise, maybe?

My first creation was something of an experiment based on what I had in the fridge.  There's isn't much to this one ... I just dumped everything in the pan and fried it.

Ingredients: red kimchi, onions, red pepper powder, sesame seeds, and sesame oil.

I served it with rice and ICing, a grapefruit-flavored makgeolli beverage that's nice on hot summer nights.

What I would change:  I would add garlic and a tiny bit of salt.  I would saute the garlic and onions before hand so they were nice and lightly caramelized while the kimchi was warm and "al dente".  Finally, some chili oil would've made it more spicy, but you can always just dump gochujang (spicy red pepper paste) or tobasco sauce on top.

All in all, a great success!

A note on salt:  My wife and I don't really like a lot of salt.  Additionally, we figure that there's enough salt in the rest of the food we eat, so I don't use very much in my cooking.  That being said, I've found recently that omitting salt entirely is often not the right choice.  If you want to try any of my recipes, you may want to add more salt to your liking!