Koyadofu tteokbokki, cooking Korean street’s sticks of fire.

Today, I’ve made tteokbokki that I call tokkpokki because that’s how I hear it and remember when I have no spell-checker. Yes, that’s hot !

Here are the ingredients :
-the ttoek are Korean mochi or blocks of rice paste. For this dish the cylinder shape is common.
-veggies (carrot, onion, garlic)
-sauce
-a protein, here tofu (that could be strings of meat, slices of fishcake or boiled egg)

The spicy Korean miso, gochujang. I’ve added paprika powder for more redness, and 2 dried hot chilis for spiciness. That way you can choose the level of hotness you wish.

Koyadofu is freeze-dried tofu. The hard blocks can be re-hydrated in water in a few minutes.

They become like sponges. I had one big block that I cut in slices.

I add the different ingredients, the sauce, water, then the ttoek and let simmer half an hour. Salt, sugar, hot chili can be added to taste.

That’s ready.

Sanchu, Korean salad. That’s not what Koreans do but I like it as a side here.

A glass of makkoli rice drink.

The meal was complete with kimchi, and green jeon pancakes.

For more : Korean Compil’

When it rains, jeon and makkoli

It was raining, raining, raining today…

When it rains, the Koreans make jeon as the noise of cooking them is similar to the sound of rain drops falling. And they drink makkoli, because… Well, I guess they must be thirsty.

I’ve got makkoli from the convenience store. It’s written in Japanese but that’s the real thing. It’s a drink made of fermented wine, close to Japanese amazake (sweet sake). But the Japanese one is for kids, while the makkoli has 6% alcohol, like a wine. I have to be careful because that’s so sweet that I’d drink that like milk, well even more easily than milk. But then, I don’t make a merry tispy fellow, just a person suddenly feeling sick. So, let’s be reasonable.

Chijimi and jeon are both names of Korean pancakes, well in Osaka, it’s all chijimi and you’ve seen some before here.
That’s the fashion to make green nira chijimi. I’ve seen restaurants had them. That’s a good idea,

nira

I have added a whole bunch of nira (garlic chives) into the blender with flour, a piece of potato and potato starch. That’s not so solid as usual, but if you flip them carefully, no problem. The taste is very green. I’ve used the color of onion and yellow bell pepper to contrast.

Add a sauce (soy sauce, black rice vinegar, water, onion, chili), the drink…and enjoy the rain !

For more : Korean Compil’

Blue veggie Spring rolls with lemon balm pesto

Today’s Spring roll are blue, leafy and full of crunchy veggies. I dip them in delicately creamy lemon balm pesto sauce.

The blue color comes from takana (Japanese mustard leaves).

I’ve used 3 layers of rice paper. First 1 layer of RP, 1 of leaves, 1 of RP, the other veggies.

I’ve rolled that and wrapped around 1 more RP. So the blue takana leaves are visible, and some green parts too. They don’t reveal the filling.

Inside : grated carrot, broad beans (blanched), young onion, powdered roasted sesame seeds and a little curry powder blend.

Pesto : lemon balm, a few leaves of beet greens, garlic, olive oil, salt. Plus some water to make it a sauce.

Tonight, let’s bibimbap

Bring me gochujang sauce ! I want a bibimbap, the delicious Korean rice dish.

Prepare all that. I cooked ground beef meat with a little garlic and a hint of soy sauce. Local supermarkets all sell platters of namul veggies, but you can prepare yours. For the detail, click here.

I don’t have a special stone dish. So I have baked the terracotta dish, passed sesame oil in the bottom, added hot cooked rice, sesame seeds, baked again.
Then you can see a cup of broth with seaweeds. A spoon and chopsticks.

Place everything on the top. That’s served.
Then with the spoon add a little broth on the gochujang and start mixing…

Midori negiyaki, always greener

A good lunch : midori negiyaki. Midori means green. Negiyaki is the Osakan hot-plate crepe filled with negi greens, the cousin of okonomiyaki. (Click here for a detailed recipe.)

Of course, a negiyaki is always green. Today, it’s greener, and garnished with an egg. It’s Spring !

How can it be greener ?
I have added to the batter, the grounds of juicing . Pasted spinach can do the trick too.

Also, I had a few stalks of spinach that served to volume up the negi. Normally, only the green part of negi is used, but I have kept some of the white and some onion that I stir-fried to decorate the bottom (and flavor it).

Cooking, adding the egg, covering, flipping…

Funny how the egg yolk popped up.

I garnished with Bulldog sauce (Japanese “Worcester”), fish flakes and dry chili.

First side-dish : hearts of romaine salad with black vinegar dressing.

Second side-dish : tofu. Yes, there is a dessert (more about it here).