Gangnam style
For Saturday dinner, I invited my guests to a country where age is counted from conception, birthdays are celebrated on January 1st, and business cards are handed out with both hands. To a country where women wear ultra-short skirts, never revealing shoulders or cleavage. To a country that is the world's mecca for plastic surgery, where burping and slurping are essential table manners, and where the basic ingredients in the kitchen are chili, chives, and onions.
First I served dumplings with buckwheat and kimchi, without which a Korean cannot imagine any meal, just as a Pole cannot imagine a potato. I made kimchi three days earlier by keeping Chinese cabbage with garlic, ginger, spring onion, carrot, soy sauce, fish sauce, chilli, sugar and a little water for two days in the heat and one day in the fridge. I made the dumpling filling from buckwheat fried with ginger, garlic, soy sauce, sesame oil, sugar, wine vinegar and finely chopped kimchi. I served the dumplings in two versions: gluten steamed and cold in rice paper for gluten-free people.
The next appetizer was rice dumplings, or Tteokbokki, a popular Korean fast food. The dumplings are made from rice flour and boiling water. After mixing them, they are formed into thick cylinders. Gochujang chilli paste is dissolved in the water with a pinch of fresh chilli. Add spring onion, sugar and sliced fish cakes, called Eomuk, which I had previously fried from ground pollock, squid, shrimp, onion, garlic, sugar, pepper, oil, egg white and corn flour. Everything is cooked until the water evaporates and the dumplings absorb all the flavours. Add boiled eggs. Sprinkle with chives and white sesame seeds.
The next appetizer was Bulgogi, a popular Korean dish, usually prepared by the customer on a grill attached to the restaurant table. I cleaned the entrecote of membranes and cut it into thin strips. I marinated it in a marinade made of blended pear, onion, garlic, chives, pepper, soy sauce, sesame oil. After six hours, I fried it in a pan. I added chives and white sesame seeds. I poured a sauce made of honey, soy sauce, and chili.
The first main course was Korean soybean paste stew. According to the famous Korean YouTuber Maangchi, from whom I got the recipe, this is a dish eaten every day by Koreans. Put diced potato, onion, zucchini, chilli, garlic, dried fish - I added anchovies instead - and shrimp in a pot. Cook for twenty minutes. Add soybean paste - I added Ssamjang paste purchased at a Korean store in Powiśle - and tofu. Cook for another twenty minutes. Garnish with chives before serving.
The second main course was the most famous Korean noodles - Jajangmyeon with black bean paste, which I bought at the same store. Fry ginger, leek, onion in oil. Add chives and mushrooms, then sliced shrimp and squid. Add a spoonful of black paste, soy sauce, oyster sauce, a spoonful of corn flour dissolved in three spoonfuls of water. Fry everything briefly, over high heat. Add any noodles - I used Korean buckwheat noodles.
For dessert I served Mochi, more popular in Japan than in Korea. I steamed a mixture of rice flour, corn flour, milk and sugar. Then I kneaded it in a kitchenaidzue with added butter. I formed balls, adding sliced strawberries with sugar to the middle, previously reduced in a pan for an hour. I rolled them in a sprinkle of cocoa and sugar. I served with a strawberry.
Samsung, K-Pop, or Crazy Kitchen? I can't decide which Korean invention is the best.
