We all met up at HanKook Market on El Camino Real in Sunnyvale.
Sowen spent two hours teaching us how to select products. The type of napa cabbage for kimchi are the big green ones. The other ones you see at other markets are great for soups not kimchi. How to pick out radish, firm, shinny ones are freshest.
How to select red chilli powder, the ones that are bright shinny red and made in Korea. Make sure to peak in the window of the bag to ensure freshness.
How to pick out soy sauce. Pick one with no wheat in the ingredient list, so that it is pure soy sauce to maximize the flavor. How to tell if it is good soy sauce, just shake it and the top should foam and bubble up.
How to pick out white sesame seeds, pick the ones that are toasted to avoid the bitter taste of raw sesame seeds. This one says no salt added in Korean.
Dried whole chilli is also another ingredient you add to make kimchi paste.
How to pick out chilli paste to make your favorite Korean dishes, pick the ones that don't have corn syrup and the least amount of items in the ingredient list. Malt syrup is the one to pick in the chilli paste ingredient listing.
This mung bean or green bean starch powder is great for making your own Cheng Po Muk or mung bean noodles a.k.a. liang pi. Mix 16 oz powder to 9 cups of water, set aside for an hour. Pour out debrie that has floated to the top and replace the mixture with same amount of liquid that was poured out. Stir and mix well over medium heat until bubbles start to burst from the mixture in the pot, turn to low heat and stir for another 5 to 7 minutes. To check if it is done, use spatula and lift some of the mixture 5 inches above the pot and it should run like thick silk. If it is still lumpy or too thick to run smooth like silk, add more water. Turn off the heat and cover with lid for 10 minutes, then pour the mixture out into a mold, let it set over night in room temperature, cut and serve. If there are left overs then put the green bean mold in water like fresh tofu to avoid edges drying out and hardening.
Coarse malt powder is for making Shike. It is the sweet malt drink that is often served at the end of a spicy Korean meal. To make 3/4 of a gallon of Shike use 1/2 pound of coarse malt powder. First soak the powder in water for 4 hours to a day in room temperature. Pour out top debrie and then use your hands to rub the powder for a minute in the water. Then pour the liquid through a filter into your cooking pot and filter out all coarse malt particles. In the pot add 1/4 cup of cooked rice and cook until desired sweetness. Optional, you can also add 2 cups of kabocha squash for flavoring. This can be served hot or chilled.
While we waited for Rinaldi and Yvonne to arrive, we had some Tie Guan Yin tea served by Victor's mom. I brought Indian samosa that I bought at the store. Megan and Franklyn brought vegan taquitos.
For lunch we had Bi Bim Ba. It is a traditional hot clay pot rice dish. For simplicity we had it without the hot clay pot. What is used for toppings are up to people. It usually consist of a min. of 5 different colors of pickles or preserved, marinated vegetables and sliced fresh herbs. Today we had a seaweed salad, mung bean sprouts, daikon, two other dishes I forgot to ask the name for, they were delicious. The red one is used in Chinese Medicine and tasted like radish kimchi. The brown one is a vegetable found in northern China and Korea in the fern family. For fresh herbs we had Japanese shiso, and daikon sprouts. The sauce that you mix the rice with is important and everyone makes it their own variation. This afternoon we had one that was mixed with the following: red chilli paste, pure sesame oil-preferably Korean or Japanese, sesame seeds toasted. Purple and white rice was served today.
This is what a green napa cabbage should look like on the inside very different fron the white napa cabbage. This is tight, firm, and shinny. To split the cabbage, make a 1/2 inch to 1 inch part at the head, then use your hands and part the cabbage into two. Parting the cabbage this way is a critical part in kimchi making sucess. Cutting the entire cabbage with a blade will change the flavor and the kimchi making process.
Then rub coarse sea salt into the leaves of the cabbage while keeping the halves intacked. Put the two halves back together and let it sweat for at least 5 hours and turn sides so the top half is on the bottom half way through to get even sweating. Then rinse the salt off the cabbage leaves and set side and drain off the water in natural drip speed on a rack.
Here is a shot of the entire ingredients for kimchi paste.
While we waited for the cabbages to sweat, Victor had a long line of friends ready to have their pulses read and new prescription written. Yvonne and Rinaldi arrived with very delicious papayas and pineapples. They baked brazil nuts at 425 degrees for at least 10 minutes in its shell and it was delicious hot.Sowen realized she forgot a few items for the kimchi paste so we headed out for the store again. Here is Yonne picking up a bag of brown rice and coarse sea salt.
Sowen also made Duk Buki and Tofu soup. The soft, soft tofu is the kind that comes in a tube not a box. The extra silky ones in a box is still not the right ones to use.
And the kimchi paste making process began. Everyone got involved.
So what is in the big pot of kimchi paste? Well, first of all it was meant for whole 12 to 14 six inch diameter napa cabbages. The following gets blended in a blender into a paste: 6 cups of fresh ginger, 2 bundes of fresh cilantro, 5 cups of seeded fresh red chilli, 3-4 cups of dried whole red chilli. This then gets mixed with the following, 1.6 litre of good grade soy sauce, 3 pounds of Korean red chilli powder, 5 tbp of sugar, 2 gallons of shredded daikon, 1/2 gallon of shredded carrots. Adding walnut and pinuts are optional. This last part is critical in the kimchi process, it replaces the raw oyster and shrimp paste. Use 3/4 cup of raw soy bean powder and mix with 1 gallon of water over low heat for about 10 minutes or until bubbles start to pop. To check to see if it is done run a spatuala a few inches above the pot and the mixture should run smooth and continus silky creamy. Set aside to cool. Use 3/4 cup sweet potato flour and mix with 1/2 to 3/4 gallon of water in low heat for also about 10 minutes or until bubbles start to pop. To check, use previous method. Mix these two chilled mixtures into the big pot of red paste.
How to stuff the paste in the cabbage? It is done leaf by leaf and then pick the whole thing up and round off the end draining off excess paste, set aside into an air tight glass or clay pickling container. Place in cool dry cellar or cold garage for at least 1 week but best to wait for a month before poping the lid and serving. The longer and slower it takes to marinate in cool temperature, the better it tastes.
It is highly advisable to wear gloves in the paste and stuffing process.
Today was a totally fun day. Jokes were like none stop. That's gotta burn of some caleries consumed today right?
Victor has his medical doctor exam to take in March 16, I think he will do well on his exam and he will be officially Dr. Victor Cheng!
