So you may have seen these kinds of videos popping up on our social media:

Korean culture, and in particular its cuisine has seen an impressive uptick in popularity in the West. Inspired by these videos, we thought it was high time to shine a spotlight on an important aspect of this world – Korean food – with a bit of an autumnal twist. Especially given that Chuseok, Korean’s Mid-Autumn Festival, occurs over September and October and food plays a very important role in the festivities.

Jeyuk-deopbap (제육덮밥 – Spicy pork rice bowl)

A great meal which is both a national Korean dish and excellent to eat in the colder months is bibimbap. Bibimbap literally translates to ‘mixed rice’, so as Yeongju explains, it is essential you mix all the ingredients together before eating! As there are so many options, we will focus on our presenter’s favourite, ‘jeyuk’ bibimbap, or spicy pork bibimbap. It is served as a bowl of warm white rice topped with namul (sautéed and seasoned vegetables) and kimchi (traditional fermented cabbage) along with gochujang (chili pepper paste), soy sauce, or doenjang (a fermented soybean paste). The main ingredient for Bibimbap sauce is often considered to be gochujang, which is a staple in Korean cooking. This particular version stands out due to its juicy broth sauce that softens the vegetables and the pork added at the end needs to be very thin. 

For vegetarians or for those who can’t eat pork, use chicken or beef, or use vegetarian meat such as seitan (a meat substitute made from seasoned wheat gluten) or firm tofu.

Gan Jang Gye Jang (간장게장 – Raw crab in marinated soy sauce)

Korean food is known for being slow-cooked and this meal attests to that. This dish is made from raw crab that is marinated in soy sauce and it is considered to be a Korean delicacy. It is also known for its soy sauce briney-taste; this stems back to the original highly salty soy-sauce brine used to preserve the crabs for a long time. The soy sauce-based gejang is also called ganjang gejang (간장게장) – this is to distinguish it from a spicy version, called yangnyeom gejang (양념게장). In Korea, gejang is normally made with a crab species called, kkotge(꽃게), or ‘horse crab’. In the US, blue crabs are often used and they are especially in season during autumn.

Whilst this may not be the easiest to prepare (you will need to handle live crabs), if you are keen on seafood and you see a chance to try this meal, give it a go!

Soon-dubu Jji-gae (순두부 찌개 – Korean spicy soft tofu stew)

One for the veggies – a Korean stew made with soft (uncurdled) tofu! Much like other Korean dishes, you can edit this meal to suit you, from using different ingredients such as kimchi, minced pork or seafood to changing the spice level. If you are making it yourself, soft tofu, or sundubu is the key ingredient and you can begin the meal with either cooking with a delicious fish stock or a beef stock. This is actually one of the quicker meals of this cuisine, taking around 30 minutes to make!

Eomuk-guk, (어묵국) or Odeng-guk, (오뎅국 – Fish cake soup)

Here, eomuk means fish cakes and ‘guk’ is the Korean word for soup. Known as Korean comfort food and often paired with the alcoholic drink, soju, this is a light broth made of water and anchovy stock where Korean fish cakes, made from surimi (this is a paste from either fish or meat), flour, carrots, onion, salt and sugar, are the main ingredients. There are many different forms of fish cakes but the preferred form is the long rectangular one so you can run these flat cakes through with wooden skewers when cooking. People often purchase packaged fish cakes for ease and it is even served as a popular street food snack. 

Tteokbokki (떡볶이 – Spicy rice cakes)

A well-known staple of Korean street food and frequently sold alongside the fish cake soup is Tteokbokki, a meal made up of spicy rice cakes in a gochujang-based sauce. Also known as topokki or ddukbokki, the dish now has multiple variations from ‘rose tteokbokki’, where milk or cream is used, inspired by the Rosé sauce, a mix of cream and tomato sauce, to ‘goong joong tteokboki’, a much milder and more savoury version, known for being served to Korean royalty (supposedly originating from the royal palace in the Joseon dynasty as Gungjung means ‘palace or royal court’).

Japchae (잡채 – Glass noodle stir fry dish)

Fun fact about this dish – the noodles are made from sweet potatoes! In the spirit of Chuseok, this is a meal often eaten over Korean festive holidays such as New Year’s Day and the Mid-Autumn Festival. It is similarly prepared like a bibimbap, served on a bed of rice (i.e. Japchae-bap, 잡채밥) as a main dish if not as a side dish. Breaking the Sino-Korean word down itself,  japchae (잡채; 雜菜) consists of two syllables, jap (잡; 雜) meaning ‘mixed’ and chae (채; 菜) meaning ‘vegetable’.

Persimmon

Stew it, fry it, bake it – persimmon is a versatile and popular autumnal fruit particularly in Korean cuisine. Found in Asian supermarkets, the fruit is often dried to be eaten much like mango. There is a clear distinction made between the two major varieties of persimmon: dan-gam (fuyu persimmons) and ddeolbeun-gam (hachiya persimmons) – dan gam can be eaten fresh whilst hard but ddeolbeun-gam must be eaten when it is soft, otherwise it is extremely bitter. A beloved form of the fruit is gotgam, dried persimmon. Persimmon are often considered a symbol of joy in Korean culture and there is even a classic Korean folktale called ‘The Tiger and The Persimmon’, where a foolish tiger develops a the fear of dried persimmon due to the cleverness of a mother.

Our Korean teachers include materials covering all kinds of culture, from food to music! So if you would like to learn the language and more, see our Korean courses here!