I met Marcel Carreiro at a Korean language school down in Sanjose last month. When everybody was about to leave, Marcel came up to me and asked if I had a recipe for “Ddeok-boggi”. “Of course I have…I have been cooking “Ddeok-boggi” all my life ever since I was a little girl…”..but wait!!!..let me think…. I DO know how to make this dish…but do I have a recipe for it? The answer was an embasassing “no”. We grow up with this food in Korea. Everybody has a special memory associated with this dish and boasts about how they cook it better than others. Most people know how to make it by heart but not many people have recipes for this dish because it’s a part of our life.

When Koreans are old enough to eat spicy Korean food (let’s say elementary school), this is what we start with for a life-long journey of spicy Korean food. Some say that Kimchi is the first spicy food to them and gradually they move on to other spicy foods. To me, it was “Ddeok-boggi” that got me into spicy food for the first time. I was sitting on a small wooden chair at a snack bar in front of my elementary school. There were a few of my friends and all of us had a handkerchief pinned to our left side. We were only 8 years old and those hankerchiefs were a requirement of the school so that we could always clean our runny noses. I still remember how spicy it was to me. We all had our hands close to our mouths and tried to create a breeze by shaking them hoping that the small wind would cool down our tongues that were on fire. I have many fond memories of sharing gossip, secrets, and even math problems over a nice bowl of this dish.

Is it rainning outside? Make this dish.
Are you getting together with friends? Everybody will ask for the recipe.
Are you watching football? It’s a great snack.
Don’t know what to make for dinner? One bowl will make your family happy and full. Did you get dumped? What do you think I’m going to say?

Speaking of occassions associated with “Ddeok-boggi” I remember a time when my husband John came to visit Korea 5 years ago(We were not married then). It was about 2:00am in downtown Seoul and after a night of bar hopping we were quite hungry. No restaurants were open at that time but the street was full of food vendors selling street food in wagons. Every vendor was selling this dish and John really wanted to try it. Do you know what he said after having a bite of the rice cake? “Hmmmm, this is like Korean pasta, isn’t it?” What an interesting concetpt? I have never thought about comparing “Ddeok-boggi” to Italian pasta. I would have never thought about calling Italian pasta “Italian Ddeok-boggi”. Well, once you make this dish and taste it, you will understand what I mean…

It took longer than I thought to scale down every ingredient I use to make “Ddeok-boggi”. After struggling with measuring spoons, measuring cups, and scales and going through several kitchen tests, I proudly present you with a fail-proof recipe for this Korean Mac and Cheese!!!

*Ingredients (4 portions)
Rice Cake: 1.3 Lb (600gm)
Low Sodium chicken stock: 4 cups (32oz)
Fish cake[Eo-mook]: 4 sheets (about 3.5 by 5.5 inch)
Green Cabbage: 1/4 head
Green Onion: 4

Red pepper paste[Gochu-jang] : 2 Tbsp
Red pepper powder[Gochu-garu]: 1 Tbsp
Soybean paste(doen-jang): 1 Tbsp
Garlic: 2 Cloves
Corn Syrup: 3 Tbsp
Sugar: 1 Tbsp
Sesame Oil: 1 tsp
Roasted sesame seeds: 1 tsp

 want to show you what kind of rice cake and fish cake you should get. For rice cakes, chose the ones about 2inchs in length and thickness of a finger. For fish cake, you can find flat ones as shown in photos.

Submerge the rice cakes in water for about an hour and drain. You can also blanch them in a pot of boiling water very briefly for about 10 seconds and drain

Cut the fish cakes in squares of 1.5 inch length. Cut cabbage into a similar size as the fish cakes. Cut Green Onions in 2 inch length.

Prepare all 8 different seasonings. Garlic needs to be minced.

In a pan, boil chicken stock at very high heat.

When chicken stock boils, add red pepper paste, red pepper powder, garlic, corn syrup, sugar, and soy bean paste. Stir well until everything dissolves.

Occasionally, skim the foam. Don’t reduce the heat.

Add rice cake and fish cake.

Once it starts boiling again stir with a spoon occasionally to prevent rice cakes from sticking to the bottom of the pan

You can see the rice cakes are getting softer, fluffy, and chubby from absorbing the liquid. Continue stiring.

The liquid has reduced by 1/3 and looks thicker due to the starch from rice cakes. Total cooking time of rice cake and fish cake till this point is about 5 minutes.

Add cabbage and stir for 1 minute. From now on, stir continuously. Be careful not to burn the rice cake on the bottom of the pan.

Turn off the heat and add green onions. Mix it all together.

Give it a last touch by adding sesame oil and sesame seeds. Mix well.

The most time consuming part of this recipe is cleaning the soybean sprout , but you can do it while watching “American Idol” or “Desperate housewives”.
Other than that,it is so easy and quick to make.
Actually,you don’t even have to trim the bean sprouts. The hairy end of it is perfectly edible, but will leave a stringy texture in your mouth and your soup is going to look like Courtney Love’s hair.
This is a very common Korean soup and is especially popular among heavy drinkers. Are you suffering from a hangover this morning? Make this soup and take a slurp from it. It will put your stomach right back in to the mood for another shot of Soju….

*Ingredients (4 portions)
Soybean Sprout : 1/2 lb
Korean radish(or Daikon): size of one apricot
Yellow onion: 1/2
Brown Seaweed: 4 x 4 inches
Green onion: 3
Garlic: 2 cloves
Water: 6 cups
Salt
Pickled shrimp juice

1.Trim off hairy end of bean sprouts, rinse them in water, and drain

2.Peel skin off the yellow onion and leave it whole.
Using a kitchen towel, brush off the white powder on the surface of the brown seaweed.
Rinse green onions in water and leave them whole also.

3.Put bean sprouts, yellow onion, brown seaweed, garlic, and green onions in a pot and pour in water. Boil it with the lid on (Make sure lid is on…otherwise the soup will taste and smell like raw beans)

4.Once the soup starts boiling and a nutty aroma is coming out of the steaming pot, lower the heat to medium and simmer for about 20 minutes.

5.Turn off heat and take out everything except for bean sprouts from the pot.

6.Season with salt and pickled shrimp juice.

A few days ago, I cooked this dish for the first time since I got married and was pleasantly surprised that my American husband liked it so much. I used to make this dish in Korea whenever there was nothing else to eat in the refrigerator. You can easily get this sprout at the corner grocery store of any neighborhood in Korea. All I did was put rice, water, and soybean sprouts in the rice cooker and push the button. When I came home from a 40 minute jog, my dinner was ready to be mixed with the sauce. I like adding ground beef because it gives a nice meaty texture and flavor but if you are a vegetarian, it is still tasty only with the soybean sprouts.

*Ingredients (4 portions)
White rice: 2 cups
Water: 2cups
Soybean sprout : 7oz/200g
Ground beef: 1 cup/7oz/200g

BEEF MARINADE
Soy sauce: 2 Tbsp
Green onion – minced: 2 Tbsp
Garlic – minced: 1 Tbsp
Sesame Oil: 2 tsp
Black pepper: 1/2 tsp

FOR SAUCE
Soy sauce: 1/3 cup
Green onion – chopped: 2 Tbsp
Garlic – minced: 1 tsp
Sugar: 2 tsp
Sesame oil: 2 tsp
Sesame seed – roasted and crushed: 1/2 Tbsp
Red pepper powder: 1 tsp

1.Wash rice several times (at least 3 times) by changing water and drain. Ratio of water and rice is 1:1 but conventionally, Koreans measure the amount of water with a finger. Put your index finger right on the surface of rice and fill the water until the water reaches the first segment of your finger.
Set it aside.

2.Mix ground beef with marinade ingredients and set it aside.

3.Trim off hairy end of bean sprouts, rinse them in the water, and drain.

4.Now it’s time to put bean sprouts into the rice. Take a look at the rice. Do you see the water has been reduced?. Don’t worry. It’s because the rice soaked up the water and you must not add more water. Spread bean sprouts on the rice.

5.Spread marinated ground beef on top of the bean sprouts. Try to make as small a lump as possible.

6.If you have an electronic rice cooker, all you need to do now is cover it and press the “Cook” button. However, if you are cooking in a pot, start with high heat (lid on) and when it comes to a rolling boil, reduce heat to low to medium. After about 5 minutes, open the lid a little and check the taste of the rice. Do you see that most of the water has disappeared and the very center of the rice tastes slightly firm? If so, then it’s time to reduce the heat one more time to VERY VERY low (Again lid on)

7.Meanwhile, mix all the ingredients for the sauce and keep it in the refrigerator.

8.Taste the rice one more time after about 10 minutes. It’s done when rice feels fully bloomed and soft on your tongue.

9.Mix rice gently with a wooden or plastic spatula and serve in a bowl with sauce on the side.

Look at this beautiful snow white rice….doesn’t it look so yummy?
When I was a little girl in 1970s, there was a shortage of rice nationwide. The rice was expensive to many Koreans and not many people could afford it. Korean government even did the campaign nationwide encouraging people to cook rice together with other grains or legumes like Barley,beans,..etc
Every lunch time in my school, teachers went through students’ lunch boxes and anyone with white rice lunch box had to clean school restrooms or classrooms as punishment.
Every meal time at home, I was very careful to finish every single grain of rice in my bowl. Otherwise,my grandmother would yell at me “this is the rice your grandfather harvested only with one hand”.(My grandfather lost one arm by an accident) Nowadays,there is more than enough rice in Korea and everybody can afford it but many people try to cook rice with other grains not for economical reason but for health reason.
Still,white rice is a main starch in Korean diet and I would like to share a tip on how to cook white rice with velvety texture interior and shiny exterior.

*Ingredients (4 portions)
White rice: 2 1/2 cups
Water: 3 cups

1.Washing rice
Pour water in the rice and using your hand gently make circls around. Becareful not to rub rice grain so hard. Drain the water, get new water,and wash rice with a hand again. Repeat this process several times (at least 4-5times)until the water gets clear.
Many Koreans try not to wash rice too much for they believe that rice nutritions get diluted into the water. But thoroughly washed rice tastes much better and looks shiner. Save rice rinsed water and use it as a stock for stew.
You can rinse your face with rice water. It makes your face very moist.

2.Measuring water
The ratio of rice and water is 1:1.2.
After washing the rice, you can totally drain the water,put rice in a pot, and pour right amount of water on it.
However,it can be too much labor and wet rice can be stucked on your corander making it very difficult to get it off. What I do is, and many Koreans do this way, I simply wash rice in a pot I am going to cook rice in and measure water with my hand.,br> Put your hand on top of rice and fill the water until it reached border line of your finger and back side of hand. You can also use your index finger and fill the water up to first segment of the finger.
Leave it for 30minutes (You will see water has reduced because rice has soaked up water. Don’t add more water!)

3.Cooking rice [5-5-5 minute tactic]
If you have a electronic rice cooker, all you have to do now is to cover the lid and press the button “Cooking”.
If you cook rice in a pot,start with very high heat until boiling with lid on. Reduce the heat to medium and leave it for about 5minutes.
Open the lid a bit and take a look inside…has water almost gone?
Then,reduce the heat one more time to very very low and leave it for 5-7minutes
Turn the heat off and leave the rice on the stove for additional 5 minutes.
Open the lid and ,using plastic or wooden spoon, gently mix it upside down trying not to crush the rice.

I am experiencing first fall season in San Francisco. People say the summer has ended here… but when? The weather is pretty much the same…(windy and sunny) I know that I have to be very careful not to be spoiled with this unbelievable California weather.

Because it is my first year in San Francisco,I still have not figured out agricultural life cycle in California. Are blueberries still available??? How much longer can we enjoy the wonderfully juicy tomatoes? I went to a farmers’ market a few days ago and what a surprise. I found this charming looking squash still around. I had to grab it without hesitation because who knows when they will be out of season.

And what did I make out of this vegetable?

Koreans make pancakes[Jeon] out of everything such as meat, poultry, seafood, vegetables..etc. It is so versatile and widely enjoyed that I dedicated one recipe category only to pancakes[Jeon]

This squash pancake is one of my favorite. It is very easy to make yet tastes so sweet and delicate that sometimes I refuse to dip it in sauce in order to fully enjoy the flavor of the squash. Make it as weekend afternoon snack or enjoy it with a bowl of rice.

*Ingredients (makes about 2 pancakes,7 inch diameter)
Squash: 2
Oil:About 2 Tbsp
Unbleached white flour : 1/2 Cup
Large egg: 1
Water: 2/3 Cup
Salt:1 tsp

In a bowl, combine flour, egg, salt, and water. Whisk well.

Peel the skin off squash and cut into strips about 2 inches by 1/4 inch.

Mix batter and squash.

Heat 1 Tbsp of oil in a non-stick pan and put in half of the batter mix. Spread well.

When the edge of pancake gets white, flip it over (Flip only once)

Wait until bottom is cooked about 1 minute.

Pyun means “Thin”,”Low”,or”Flat” and Soo means “Water”. I assume Pyun refers to the shape of dumpling which is squre and kind of flat and Soo refers to the way of serving this dish. Pyunsoo was originated from “Gae-sung”, one of main cities in North Korea. During the summer time, we use perishable vegetables like cucumber or squash to make this dumplings and serve them in either ice cold beef broth or just cold dumpling itself with soy sauce.
It is considered somewhat fancy and traditionally this dumpling used to be enjoyed by king during the summer time. I serve my guests this dish as an appetizer exactly the same way as above picture. I fill ice cubes in bamboo steamer and arrange dumplings on top and garnish with bamboo leaves. It never fails to Wow my guests.

*Ingredients (makes about 25 dumplings)
Dumpling Wraps(square): 25

Ground Beef: 1 cup
BEEF SEASONING
Soy sauce: 1 Tbsp
Sugar: 1 tsp
Green onion minced:1 Tbsp
Garlic minced: 1 tsp
Roasted Sesame seed crushed: 1 Tbsp
Sesame Oil: 2 tsp
Black pepper: 1/2 tsp

Dried Shitake mushroom: 3
MUSHROOM SEASONING
Soy sauce: 1 tsp
Sugar: 1/2 tsp
Black pepper: pinch
Sesame oil: A drop

Squash: 1
Cucumber: 1
Egg white: 1
Pine nuts: 50
Flour: About 1/2 cup
Salt
Sesame oil

1.Gather all the ingredients together

2.Sumberger dried Shitake mushrooms in a bowl of hotwater until soft.
Drain water out of mushrooms by squeezing them with hands.
Take stems off and cut thin julienne. Mix mushrooms with seasoning and stir fry it in hot oiled pan. Cool it down.

3.In a bowl, add ground beef and beef seasoning ingredients and mix well.,br> Stir fry it in a hot oiled pan and cool it down.

4.Cut squash in about 1inch/2cm length,slick skin off, and julienne as shown in picture.
Sprinkle 1 Tbsp of salt on julienned squash skin and when it is slightly wilted, rinse it under cold running water,squeeze it gently with hands.
Sit fry it in a hot pan very quickly about 10 seconds and season it with salt and sesame oil. Cool it down.

5.Prepare cucumber exactly same was as squash.

6.Mix beef,mushroom,squash,and cucumber. You are done with stuffing part. (Was’n it easy and fun?)

1.Now the fun process begins…time for forming dumpling!!!! Gather wraps,egg white,pine nuts,stuffing,and floured sheetpan.

2.Take one wrap out of package and put it in front of you.

3.Take a spoonful of stuffing,put it right in the middle of wraps,and top it with 2 pine nuts.

4.Wet aournd all edges of wrap with egg white.

5.Bring opposite corners together and pinch close as shown in step by step picture above

6.Line them up in a lightly floured sheet pan

7.Cook dumplings in a pot of boiling water. Stuffing is precooked so it doesn’t take a longtime,about 1 minute .
When the wrap looks translucent, take dumplings out and cool them down.

“Jeotgal” or “Jeot” is a very salty fish sauce made of naturally fermented fish, shellfish, shrimp, oysters, fish roe,intestines and other ingredients.  These are tiny little shrimp (less than an inch) salted and fermented with20% of salt for at least 2-3 months in temperature between 15-20 Celsius. With a clean and mild taste,salted shrimp is mainly used to make Kimchi. Sae-u-Jeot is often used as a dipping sauce or condiment for meats, especially pork. Its meat and juice are also used as a replacement for salt in a recipe.
Skins of shrimp are softened to eat as a source of calcium.

Many of my American and European friends (don’t forget my husband) can not stand with the smell
and have made somewhat disrespectful comments even without trying it. But, hey, many foods in this world need to be stinky in order to be tasty.  Take blue cheese for example��when I tried that thing for the first time��..oh men!!!!  It smelled like socks worn 100 times not washed for 365 days!!!  Now? I dream about those blue bacteria crumbles and can not live without it. It is all matter of getting used to it and developing palette for it

Due to its reputation for unique(?) smell, the usefulness of Sae-U-Jeot goes beyond culinary boundary. It is sometimes used in unexpected way by people who try to make their voice heard in public places. They spread this stinky shrimp around during the demonstration to suffocate police officer trying to get them. Would you like to cry out your political messages in public places and don’t want to be bothered by those big brothers trying to drag you out of the street? Carry this Sae-U-Jeot with you. Its smell will surely chase them away.

They are usually packed in jars and you should try to find ones with bigger, brighter, and chubby shrimp.

It is one of the main condiments that makes many Korean foods bright red and very spicy.
Chilis were first introduced in Korea in the 16th century and this Gochu-jang made from
dried red-chilli powder has been in the pantry of every single Korean household ever since.

The red pepper paste is made from starch, powdered fermented soybeans, red chili powder,
salt, water and is traditionally fermented in the sun.
Different starches are used including sweet rice powder, barley powder, or wheat flour.

The condiment has a dark red color with a pasty consistency.
It has a spicy, salty, and slightly sweet flavor.
Koreans use this red pepper paste to flavor dishes, marinate meats, and also use it as a condiment.

You will have no problems finding red pepper pastes in any Korean market.
They are usually packed either in jars or square shaped plastic containers.
Go to the refregirated section and you will spot red pepper paste in many different brands and packages.
One thing most of them seem to have in common is that they are all bright red in color.

I am on the way to a restaurant for dinner and what is happening here???
This place is called Myungdong, one of many many downtowns in Seoul.
Some girls are on the stage and ready to do something. Can you guess?
Oh..Yeh…

They started dancing and singing together…

this one looks like some sort of combination of “American Idol”

and “So you think you can dance”.

I walk down the road and see one guy holding up a pink-colored sign that says “I can hug you like a spring breeze”.
I have no idea…what is his intention?
Does he charge people for hugging?
Is it that difficult to get a hug in Korea?
Is he going to hug only girls or guys as well?
I wait a few more minutes to see if anyone comes by and asks for a hug, but nobody…

Every night,this street gets jampacked with street vendors selling food, accessories, clothes, shoes….etc.

Yesterday, today, and tomorrow…..
Fishcake soup[Odeng]and Ddeok boggi [Spicy rice cake pasta] are my all time favorites.

I finally arrive at the restaurant.
“Myungdong Kal-gooksoo” has been in business for nearly 40 years.
As citizens of Seoul, there are places one should know if you do not want to be considered a spy from North Korea.
This restaurant is one of them. I see a signboard written in Japanese.
I guess this place is very well known to Japanese tourists as well.

This is my table and I see a white plastic board standing in the middle. How weired????
I soon realized that this table is a two person table, but meant for two strangers who don’t want to look at each other during dinner.
What a thoughtful hospitality arrangement?
They even made a hole at a bottom so that two strangers can share a sauce
without having to look at each other or say “excuse me..”

While waiting for my dinner to come, I look around the kitchen.
Plates are piled up and some small kimchi dishes are ready to go.

Their menu is very simple…just a few noodle dishes and dumplings.

It smells so good…the smell I am so used to.
It is noodle and dumplings in very thick chicken broth.
They serve it with kimchi and a small bowl of rice.

I want to try a dumpling first. The dumpling dough is so thin that you can see the stuffing through it.

The dumpling is stuffed with pork, Asian chive, and some other ingredients.
The photos is not very clear here because I was so busy eating and it made it very difficult to focus.

Their kimchi is known to be very unique, very saucy and extra spicy.
Actually, the kimchi is as popular as the noodles.
I would love to know how they make their kimchi….they seem to use fresh ground red pepper together with pepper seeds.
This addictive Kimchi is super spicy!!!

My stomach is full and my soul is all spiced up with too much Kimchi I had at the restaurant.
 It is 11:00pm now but many people are still hanging out on the street.
My first day in Seoul went very well and I am very excited about Korean food I will venture out tomorrow.

In march 2007,I visited Seoul for the first time since I moved to US.
It was raining and damp chilly but how can I complain???
I WAS IN SEOUL!!!!!.

I checked in hotel room and opened the curtain.
I kept staring at city view of Seoul for a long time.

This hotel room is more than I expected.
Very clean built in kitchen. (Better than my home kitchen…)

And chic trendy bathroom. (Of course, cleaner than my home bathroom..hehehe)

The most importantly,this room is “Ondol” room.
“Ondol” is traditional Korean heated floor system.
The water pipe runs underneath floor and heat the floor by increasing water temperature.
Few years ago, E! channele was showing a house of Brad Pitt and Jennifer Aniston
talking about exclusive heated floor installed in the house.
In Korea,every house has heated floor system and it is not that expensive at all.
I really miss my tiled bathroom floor warming my feet while taking shower.

Spacious closet and a TV with Korean programs…
(Yes, I can watch Korean drama every night!!!)

Next morning,I headed to a subway station and found this coffee vending machine.
(Coffee machine is everywhere in Seoul) This is quite advanced version of what I am used to.
The vending machine only had 4-5 menu options and it was only 300won.
Now it has become mobile Starbucks in terms of menu variety and price.

Got off from subway and where am I ?
This is Ehwa Women’s univ. area. It is about 10:00am and the street is quite empty.
This whole area in front of university is known as a heaven for shopping
filled with so many fashion stores,restaurants,and beauty salons.

This is entrance gate of Ehwa univ. There seems to be construction going on inside of school.

This is one of main alleys in front of school and it gets very crowded from the afternoon
with hundreds of people (Mainly beautiful girls).
Oh, how many times did I walk on this street up and down with friends.
Although I didn’t graduate from this school,this place was my second home,
a major place for hang-out and shopping.

This restaurant “Gami” has been in business since 1975
and its tasty food and low price have attracted many of college students
and people like me who needs quick lunch between shopping.
Everybody knows this restaurant and the name of restaurant “Gami” means “Flavoring” in Korean.

As you can see, menu is very easy to understand and I am very pleased with price.
It seems like they have added few new menus and I ordered Gami udon.

Um….looks so yummy!!! The noodle soup broth is made with dried anchovy…just the way I want…
But I immediately sense something is not quite to my taste.

Both main dish and side dishes are RED, RED, RED..!!!!..:-(…
I DO love spicy food and I HAVE craved for this fiery,bloody,hot Korean food everyday living in US
but I don’t like every single food on table smothered with red chilly pepper powder.
I love red cabbage Kimchi and I love Kimchi-jjigae but I don’t like eating them together.
(Am I too picky?)

I felt the need of balancing this red food with non-red food and ordered this whity rice ball.
It is made with sweet rice which is a lot more stickier than ordinary Korean rice.
When you bite into it, ground beef stuffed inside will surprise you with unexpected flavor and texture.
The black ribbon outside is “Gim”(A.K.A Nori).
It is really tasty as it is or you can dip it into yellowish mustard vinaigrette shown in the picture.

Overall, it was very good lunch.
The rice ball and red soup noodle went very well together.
If you happen to be in this school area, I strongly recommend you try this restaurant for lunch.
Restaurant is very clean and waitresses are kind.
Especially,if you want to experience what it is like to be totally surrounded by beautiful, young, and, sophisticated Korean girls,
there is no better place to go.