Theme for day 4- '궁중상추쌈' or royal lettuce wraps.
Day 3 & 4. I just have to say these past few days were a lot of fun. Not only were the things we had to make challenging, but the history portion of the class was quite interesting. For those who live in Korea (mainly speaking to ex-pats, foreingers) you may ask yourselves when eating Korean food why everything is pickled, marinated, and you don't see a whole of just 'fresh' veggies. Well, a bit of history that I learned. During the days when the King ruled the land, everyone had to produce items for 'the palace' or '궁'. However, since it took days to have the items delivered to the palace, you never found raw fish, fresh veggies, and even some fruits. Everything had to be dried and preserved before it entered the palace. Therefore once it entered the palace grounds, the chefs had to create dishes soley upon what they received. So when studying royal cuisine recipes, everything is marinated, fried, cooked all the way trough, etc. This explains a lot as to what we know of Korean cuisine today. However, the farmers & peasants ate the most fresh vegetables & fruits, and 'bibim bop' gave birth in that very comnumity (thus I hear they live for a long time). Interesting how this dish is one of the dishes that is most recoginized today when it comes to Korean cuisine!
Below is what I learned days 3 & 4.
도미면-Sea bream fish with noodles.
The process to make this-you filet the fish, make the broth with the head & bones. Then with the flesh you pan fry with eggs & flour. You then place in bowl, and add the broth at the end. The yellow, white, and black speckled things you see on the bottom-all made out of eggs! To make this, it's a whole class in itself.
대합구이-Baked clams in shell.
With this you pan fry the clams in water, take out the cooked flesh. Mince and mix with beef & tofu (and other marinade), stuff in shells, add batter (eggs & flour), pan fry again face down, then finish off buy grilled on stones (See photo below).
I love this grill or griddle thing-you can find it at most stores for under 5,000 won.
When grilling this fish, some tips I learned was to 'foil' the head and tail so it doesn't burn.
보리새우볶음-Pan fried shrimp shells.
This is a photo is what our team made. The first photo in this post is what the instructor prepared. Fun tips on how to eat this: you wrap the rice and veggies on the outside stem part of the lettuce (I wish I had a photo!). Not sure if this makes sense, but usually we're used to placing the items on the front side of the lettuce (as restaurants usually serve it this way). Before eating, flip it the other way, so the stem is in the inside. They say that it's softer when eating, and looks better when eating in front of others! Also, add a drop of sesame oil in the wrap as well.
It was a rainy day, wanted to take a snapshot of our view...
To be continued...