For those who weren’t aware, I was adopted from S. Korea when I was 5 years old. Growing up in Korea, you’re going to eat a lot of kimchi. Of course, when I came to the United States, and especially to northern Michigan, kimchi was about the only type of food that my parents could offer me in the way of “comfort foods”. Unfortunately, about the only kimchi you could get was at your local grocery store, which wasn’t the greatest, but it did suffice. After a few years, I started to get away from kimchi and enjoyed the finer American cuisine offerings.

It wasn’t until I was almost done with my undergrad years at the University of Michigan that a friend of mine made me a homemade Korean meal. He was only in the United States to attend high school and college, and was about to move to Philadelphia to attend dental school before returning to Korea. This immediately sparked my interest in eating Korean food again as many of the smells and tastes began instantly recognizable. That summer, after graduating, his family invited me to come stay with them for almost two weeks and we traveled all over Korea enjoying amazing foods. When I returned back home, I began making Korean food of my own, albeit not very good at first. It also re-sparked my interest in kimchi again. Luckily the wife also enjoys kimchi as much as I do!

One of my favorite Korean restaurants in Ann Arbor serves an excellent kimchi stew. After my wife bought me a korean cookbook, we tried the kimchi stew recipe in there and were decently happy with the outcome. Over the past few years, I’ve  modified a few recipes and have come up with a rather simple, but delicious recipe. The important thing is to have good kimchi! Being in Northern Michigan, this is not possible. We get ours from a large Korean Market in Ann Arbor – they get theirs from Chicago. Usually, the older the kimchi, the better. You don’t want to use “fresh” kimchi right when you get it. While I’ve made this plenty of times when the kimchi was just bought from the store, you’ll get the best flavors from older kimchi. It’s probably why it’s often used in a stew, as it’s “ripened” a bit. The kochujang and kochukaru were also found at the Korean market, though you may be lucky if your local grocery store carries a decent selection of international products. I’ve also ordered both from the internet as well.

Ingredient List:

1 lb pork – sliced/diced
1 onion – diced
1 package tofu – diced
3 cups kimchi – cut
1 tbsp sesame oil
3 scallions – chopped
1 tbsp soy sauce
1 tbsp kochujang
1 tbsp kochukaru
2 cloves garlic – chopped

Directions:

Take 3/4 to 1 lb of pork (or chicken or whatever meat, seafood you want – I think pork is the best) and either slice it into thin strips or dice it. I’ve done both, and they’re both good. In this case, I diced mine. I like to buy the thinly sliced pork in about 1 lb packages, makes for easier slicing.

Drizzle 1 tbsp of sesame oil into a large pan and bring the heat to high. Move the pork around to make sure that all the pork has been lightly coated in the sesame oil.

Cook the pork until the outside is just turning color. Dont’ worry about cooking the pork all the way through, the pork will get plenty of heat throughout the rest o the cooking process to cook through.

Take your 2-3 cups of cut kimchi:

and add it to the pot. Stir fry on high for about five minutes.

After five minutes, add your garlic, kochujang, kochukaru and mix it all up.

After a few more minutes, add your onion.

Add three cups of water, bring it to a boil, then reduce the temperature to low – simmer and let it simmer for 20-30 minutes.

10 minutes into the simmer state, take one cube of firm tofu and dice it up.

Add it to the pot and let it simmer for another 10-20 minutes.

Right before serving, add the scallions:

Serve and enjoy!

If you have good ramen, adding that just before serving also makes a nice touch. I’ve also added thin sliced potatoes and shrimp as well in the past.

This ones comes, thanks to Dave Karczewksi. Dill pickles, a great summertime snack, and generally a pain in the butt to can. Which may explain why I’ve never canned dill pickles (or anything elsefor that matter).

This one doesn’t actually involve any canning, boiling or anything complicated like that.

Here’s the ingredients:

• 4 Heads Dill
• 4 Cloves Garlic
• 2 1/2 cup Vinegar
• 2 1/2 cup Water
• 1/4 cup kosher salt
• 8 Salad/Pickling Cucumbers

It doesn’t get any easier than this.

• Heat vinegar, water and salt until it dissolves. Shouldn’t take too long.
• Put garlic and dill into a 1/2 gallon jar. Pour mixture into a 1/2 gallon jar and let it come to room temperature.
• Quarter the pickles and stuff them in jar. Refrigerate.

I’m told by the source that you can use the brine again for a second batch, add vinegar/water/salt as needed. The third batch, not so much. Start over. But since it’s so easy, shouldn’t take too much time to do.

This has to be in my top 10 favorite foods. Flank Steak is just good eats, as Alton Brown would say. Perhaps you know it by its other commonly known name of London Broil. It’s also a bit tougher than other cuts of beef, so it’s often marinated and is common in asian dishes such as Mongolian Beef.

I got this recipe from Guy Fieri, you know – the spikey faux blond guy on Food Network.  But as with all recipes, I never follow it exactly, I’m pretty sure that every recipe I ever make changes a bit, no matter how many times I make it.

Here’s the ingredient list:

• 1 cup roughly chopped garlic (approximately 3 bulbs)
• 3/4 cup freshly squeezed lime juice (approximately 8 large limes)
• 1/2 cup clear tequila
• 1/4 cup soy sauce
• 1 bunch roughly chopped cilantro, leaves and stems
• 1 jalapeno pepper, seeded and diced
• 1 serrano pepper, seeded and diced
• 1 teaspoon cumin powder
• 1 tablespoon freshly cracked black pepper
• 1 1/2 to 2 pounds flank steak

First thing I did was place the flank steak into a zip lock bag and added about 1 cup of tequila. Yes, I know the recipe calls for 1/2 cup, but I just told you I don’t follow the recipe exactly   No need for the fancy stuff, bottom shelf tequila will work fine it’s just marinade after all – we’re not shooting this grade.

Next, I squeezed limes to make about 3/4 cup of pure lime juice and added that to the zip lock bag. The recipe says that it will require about 8 limes, but I found that it only took me about 4 to get about 3/4 cups worth:

Next – chop up a TON of garlic! You need 1 cup worth, which came out to be about 3 large BULBS, not cloves! This is serious garlic folks. Also chop up 1 bunch of fresh cilantro.

Add the fresh cracked black pepper,  cumin powder, soy sauce,  and chopped jalapeno peppers into the zip lock and give is a good shake! You’re going to want to let this sit and marinade in the fridge for at least 2-3 hours to really let the marinate set in and break down the meat a bit.

After 2-3 hours in the fridge, take out and let it sit at room temperature for another 35-45 minutes.  At this point, remove the steak from the zip lock, set aside and bring the marinade to a boil on the stove. Once it reaches a boil, you can remove from the heat and strain the chunks out of it. You can save it or toss it. If you save it, you can reuse all that garlic for another future recipe. I’m all about reusing stuff here!

Cook the flank steak over medium-high heat for 5-7 minutes on each side. I like mine medium-rare, so that turned out to be about the right amount of time on each side for me, yours may differ based on temperature and setting.  Feel free to grill some asparagus too, my favorite way to eat it!

When it’s done, cover it with some aluminum foil for at least 5 minutes. Cutting into it too soon is a common mistake – lets all the good juices out. After 5 minutes of resting, cut across the grain, spoon some of the heated up marinade and enjoy!

Food. It’s an amazing thing really. So much so that “Nick” and “food” just seem to be have always been associated with each other. Though I love to eat food, I have just recently started to branch out into the world of actually making my own food – as in, really try to make delicious food other than sandwiches, bagged lettuce, frozen meals, canned soups, frozen waffles…. you get the picture.  Here are the reasons:

• It’s been brought to my attention (wife) that I need to be more adventurous in the world of culinary exploration (cooking, not eating. I’ll eat just about anything).

and

• I’m becoming much more aware of what I’m putting into my body.

After having read Fast Food Nation, and Watching King Corn, I’m starting to really think about the substances that I eat on a daily basis. It’s with that in mind that I’m going to start chronicling the food that I eat – so that I can keep track of what I’m eating as well as perhaps store some of my favorite recipes and ideas.