Artisanal soy sauce

I’ve been tasting several soy sauces lately.  The difference between grocery store bought balsamic vinegar or olive oil compared to artisanal ones are enormous, so enormous that this would be for another day, another long post.  I don’t remember what my mom used when she was in Korea other than the fact that she had several different types of soy sauce, but ever since we moved to the States, she’s been using Yamasa instead of more accessible Kikkoman.  A couple of Japanese restaurants I worked at during my poor years preferred Kikkoman over Yamasa for some unknown reason…

Yamasa, the other standard

Kikkoman, the actual standard

…because these two are pretty damn similar.  Very salty.  Low sodium ones always suck a little more than regular ones.  This cannot possibly be the only options, right?  I mean, this is like choosing Bertoli versus Colavita.  There are subtle differences, yes, but really?  No.  I tasted some more:

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How to cook rice without a rice cooker

My rice cooker is broken.  I don’t want to talk about the details of how it came to be so broken because it was just stupid.  But here is the sad state of my rice cooker:

broken top

the hinge is messed up

so it doesn't close anymore

unless I put a big book on top

Mom’s Korean BBQ Marinade

attack of chopsticks: restaurant version

You’ve probably had Korean BBQ ribs like the ones above at a restaurant before with your friends, right?  If not, you are missing out and you should immediately gather some friends and go.  If you already have, it should be nice to know that the dish is very easy to make at home.

Kalbi was the first proper Korean dish I made.  It’s super easy to make, super easy to play around and change it around to make your own, super easy to incorporate into another dish.  Kalbi and soju (cheap Korean liquor) makes for good times, guys.  Even for some eclectic, awkward mix of people like these:

cheers!

I’ve seen many variations on this but the below is the easiest and easily the best (it’s my mom’s recipe).

Eating Alone by Li-Young Lee

I’ve pulled the last of the year’s young onions.
The garden is bare now.  The ground is cold,
brown and old.  What is left of the day flames
in the maples at the corner of my
eye.  I turn, a cardinal vanishes.
By the cellar door, I wash the onions,
then drink from the icy metal spigot.

Once, years back, I walked beside my father
among the windfall pears.  I can’t recall
our words.  We may have strolled in silence.  But
I still see him bend that way-left hand braced
on knee, creaky-to lift and hold to my
eye a rotten pear.  In it, a hornet
spun crazily, glazed in slow, glistening juice.

It was my father I saw this morning
waving to me from the trees.  I almost
called to him, until I came close enough
to see the shovel, leaning where I had
left it, in the flickering, deep green shade.

White rice steaming, almost done.  Sweet green peas
fried in onions.  Shrimp braised in sesame
oil and garlic.  And my own loneliness.
What more could I, a young man, want.

Persimmons

Persimmons have always been a staple autumn and winter fruit for me. There are two kinds, a more opaque colored one with a shape of mochi and a flat bottom and  a more translucent, deeper colored one with long oval shape and pointed bottom.  New York Times and other blogs are calling them by their Japanese names, the first Fuyu and the second Hachiya.  I know them as the one my mother loved, more readily available and therefore cheaper, referred to as regular persimmons; the other one my mother never purchased for me, the one we called yeon shi, meaning the soft persimmon.  She purchased it only one at a time, reserved for the baby cousin visiting us for Korean Thanksgiving.

NY Times picture of Fuyu persimmon

Tea and Cookies blog picture of Hachiya

The Clean Plater by Ogden Nash

Some singers sing of ladies’ eyes,
And some of ladies lips,
Refined ones praise their ladylike ways,
And course ones hymn their hips.
The Oxford Book of English Verse
Is lush with lyrics tender;
A poet, I guess, is more or less
Preoccupied with gender.
Yet I, though custom call me crude,
Prefer to sing in praise of food.
Food,
Yes, food,
Just any old kind of food.

Garum Colatura

If you like anchovies but you don’t want to actually deal with it, use garum colatura.  Here is the image I took from Zingerman’s website:

And, here is the New York Times article on garum colatura.  Melissa Clark called it “a translucent amber liquid that is the very essence of anchovy.”  Now who can resist that?  (Actually a lot of people.  I know a few who won’t eat anything anchovy.  I’m just talking to people who like anchovies.  Well, anyone who enjoys briny seafood should give it a try anyway, you may like it.)

I like pasta!

I’ve always preferred rice over any type of noodles or pasta, but I’ve grown quite fond of pasta lately.  For a recent pasta tasting, I had to do some reading on pasta and ended up really hooked on it.  My favorite way to eat pasta is to saute some garlic in olive oil, add al dente pasta in it, grate some parmigiano reggiano, add a few drops of good balsamic vinegar, toss the whole thing with Halen Mon salt and pepper.  Simple and lovely…sigh.

Anyway, if you want to learn more about pasta, I highly recommend Pasta: the Story of a Universal Food by Silvano Serventi and Françoise Sabban:

The book is divided into a longer part on western pasta followed by a shorter part on Chinese noodles.  It focuses mostly on the history of it all but doesn’t fail to include fun factoids like, Casanova had such a tasty pasta dish and was so satiated that he could not perform the act of love.  Yeah, that is all it comes down to for me to judge a book, fun factoids.  Keeps things lively.

Mom’s Kimchi Dumplings

Every New Year my whole extended family gathers around and makes dumplings. Everyone–uncles, aunts, cousins, kids–helps out to make hundreds of dumplings. I kid you not, hundreds of dumplings for days. Rows and rows of dumplings cover every flat surface we have in the house and there are jokes, laughter, little fights, family drama and good times. It makes for fond memories.

…or it did until I moved to this country.  I just feel like I don’t have much cultural roots here at least as far as holidays go.  I hate going to New Year’s Eve parties where people get drunk and I try to faint interest and small talk, watch the ball drop or whatever. I don’t like watching the parade (or is that Thanksgiving Day?) and I sure don’t watch Rose Bowl despite the fact that I am a former wolverine. The first and only time I saw the inside of the football stadium was on my graduation day.

I wanted my dumplings. And the rice cake soup. I called my mother for her recipe and she responded with her usual, “I will make them myself and send them to you! Oh, better yet, why don’t I go visit you and make the dumplings right there? I can move in with you too so you can have my dumplings any time your heart desires!” thing. I politely and graciously said thanks, but no thanks. And I got her recipe instead. Here it is:

How to eat the curry I made for you

curry is in the pot

the pot is on the stove

rice is in the rice cooker

the rice cooker is on the counter

the chicken is on the counter

covered with foil

take a plate

get some rice

put curry on rice

put the chicken on and eat it!