by jessica yoon
Yesterday, I shared with you a great way to use leftover, stale rice. Today, I will tell you about the side dish I ate it with: soy braised burdock! Burdock is a root most commonly used in Japan where it’s called gobo. In Korea it’s called woo-ung, 우엉, and it’s mainly used in kimbap, 김밥, a dish similar to the Japanese sushi roll. Burdock has a sort of sweet, earthy taste that disappears when cooked. After it’s cooked, the texture is similar to the potatoes in this dish.
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September is such a fresh and exciting month. It’s the start of fall, a new school year, and the beginning of a marathon of holidays. I find this month to be very festive in a non-holiday related sort of way, if that makes any sense. There’s a very pleasant golden glow to everything, which makes me feel very hopeful.
In preparation for the future parties/get togethers you may hold for Halloween, Monday night football, cold weather birthdays, Thanksgiving, Christmas, and even New Year’s, I thought I’d share with you a great party food. Drumsticks! Not fried, but baked!
My mom makes really tasty soy glazed drumsticks but I didn’t have time to call her so I tried to come up with a marinade from memory. It didn’t turn out exactly the same, but it was good in its own way. The drumsticks were very tender and juicy, with a nice salty touch from the soy sauce. A lot of people don’t like to cook or eat chicken because it gets really tough and dry, but there’s a secret method to keeping it nice and moist: soaking in milk! It sounds odd, possibly even icky, but trust me it works. There is absolutely no dairy aftertaste, if that was what you were worrying about. My roommate let me in on the secret and I have never skipped this step since.
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In general, I don’t cook Korean very often. I have a tendency to be drawn towards rustic Italian dishes or interesting ingredients like quinoa and wheat berry. These foods feel more exotic to me so many times I skip the Korean and cook up something I’ve never eaten before. I don’t think that’s a bad thing, but I do think it’s a bit sad that I barely know how to cook what I call my comfort food.
To redeem myself a little bit, there is one Korean dish I know well and have almost mastered. It is a browned tofu in a spicy soy sauce. In Korean it’s called tubu chorim, 두부조림, which roughly translates to tofu boiled in sauce. It’s very easy and fast. It does require a couple of Asian condiments like soy sauce and sesame oil, but if you don’t have those in your pantry I highly encourage you to get them. Soy sauce is well known, but sesame oil may not be. It is a vegetable oil made from sesame seeds that is intensely fragrant and used in many Asian dishes.
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