My parents live in Los Angeles and until just recently, so did my brother. About three times a year, I go back to LA to hang out with the family, get my In-N-Out Burger fix and get the very important big dose of smog and traffic. It’s important because it gives me that fantastic talking point when the Los Angelenos ask me, “why the heck did you move to Bradenton, Florida?” Hmmm…well, let me cough the reasons!

Just a few days ago, my brother, Jay, packed his bachelor belongings in a moving truck and moved to Wichita, Kansas to start a brand new fancy job as a Doctor of Cardi-$dollar$-gy. At first, I was like, “Are you crazy? Giving up living in Beverly Hills to go live in Kansas?”

Not that I have anything against the good state of Kansas, it’s just that it’s a totally different lifestyle than the fast-paced, Botox’d, diamond-studded city of Angels.

Last night, Jay called. He’d just arrived after a couple days of driving to his new home, “Hey sis, you must come and visit. FOR THE BAR-B-QUE!!!” He went on to describe the pulled pork and smoked ribs that he’s sampled in the past 24 hours.

That was a good enough reason to commit one of the most important holidays of the year, Thanksgiving, to haul my family to Wichita, Kansas for a week’s vacation. And it got me thinking. Take award-winning barbequed pulled pork and combine it with an Korean style barbeque sauce and a puckery Asian cucumber relish. The result is something you’d find on the street corner of Cahuenga and Sunset Boulevard in Hollywood, the Kogi BBQ truck.

As I’m sure you’ve heard, Kogi is the hottest thing to hit the streets of Los Angeles (literally!), smashing standard taco truck fare with the zing and spice of Korean flavors. They use Twitter to announce their itinerary for that evening and serve hundreds of people at each stop. Sometimes, the lines form an hour before the truck even arrives and snakes carelessly around cars, fire hydrants and benches.

I haven’t sampled their fare, I gave one of the owners, Alice Shin, a call and told her that I’d like to make a pulled pork taco from smoked pulled pork. Alice was able to nudge their chef, Roy Choi, into creating a BBQ sauce to match the deep smoky flavor of traditional BBQ’d pulled pork.

This recipe is mid-west meets Los Angeles. Good luck with your new adventure, my brother.

Korean Style Tacos with Kogi BBQ Sauce on Daytime TV

I would have loved to pair good ol’ spicy kimchi with these tacos, but my local Asian store had really sad looking kimchi. So, last minute, I decided to create a quick cucumber pickle for television as well as the photo shoot.

Dr. BBQ and I tag teamed that morning on a Daytime segment – he made his very famous pulled pork smoked in the Big Green Egg in a Carolina Pulled Pork Sandwich with Spicy Tangy Slaw (I also posted the video) – and I took his leftovers to make these Korean Style Tacos with Kogi BBQ Sauce.

hey, p.s. the video shows you what happens when you forget your dang mandoline and end up slicing cucumbers by hand in a hurry. They look like hockey pucks. Use a mandoline.

Thank you Sur La Table for providing the Shun Perfect Paring Knife and the beautiful Foldable Grilling Tools

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Other great recipes from around the web

Kimchi Recipe by David Lebovitz
Bulgogi Kimchi Tacos by My Korean Kitchen
Korean Beef Tacos by Week of Menus
Korean Short Rib Tacos by Tasty Eats at Home
Kimchi Pork Belly Pizza by No Recipes

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Slideshow of Korean BBQ Beef on Crispy Wonton Chip

Fundraising events these days usually include children hawking stuff I don’t need (enough magazines already!) athletic events (can’t I just drive that 5K?) or food and wine events (oh yeah, sign me up baby!) These folks who run food and wine festivals sure got the formula right. Have a bunch of local restaurants dish out samples of their food, wine and beer companies dole out unlimited pours. All they need to complete this formula is maybe a few tour buses, you know, the good ones that have reclinable seats and drive you around town and let you sleep off that gorge-and-glug fest.

A couple of weeks ago, I attended the Florida Aquarium’s SeaGrapes event. Tables and tables of vendors snaked in and out, around and about the aquarium. Over 800 people sipped and snacked their way through the event. It was a record year, they netted over $87,000. People were bidding like crazy at the silent auction! These silent auctions are such a smart thing, get a bunch of people happy-drunk and let them compete with each other to bid on prizes. Love it.

At the Florida Aquarium SeaGrapes event, almost every restaurant vendor served seafood. You know I love my fish…but it was just sorta weird to be waving hi to Nemo while enjoying one of his mates on my plate. But then I found Chef Rick from Publix Apron Cooking School who made a Korean BBQ Beef on Crispy Wonton Chip appetizer that my meat-lovin’ husband just raved about. I’ve modified their recipe a bit, making it easier for the home cook.

The flank steak is marinated in Korean-style sauce. While technically this isn’t “Korean BBQ” it does use similar ingredients in the marinade and the secret ingredient….grated pear.

The pear does 2 things. It sweetens the marinade and it also tenderizes the beef. It’s the secret ingredient of authentic Korean BBQ beef. You’ll grate the pear with a large-holed grater. Traditionally, an crispy Asian pear is used, but you can really use any type of pear.

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More Korean BBQ Beef…

Korean BBQ Kalbi (Short Ribs) and Bulgogi Recipe

or how about Korean noodle dish to go with it?

Korean Glass Noodles – Chap Chae/Jap Chae

from the Steamy Kitchen archives….

The software that runs my website has a nifty little feature that tells me what terms people are entering into the search box when they come to Steamy Kitchen. Although smart authors would probably use this information to enhance their site and serve the needs of their readers, the only reason I check this page is for comic relief. Most terms are legit, such as a recipe for jap chae, but at least once a day, I find a gem, something that just makes me giggle. It’s a total mystery why someone would come to my Asian recipes Web site and enter into the search box: “what foods give you spots” and expect that I have the answer!? I doubt if these people ever found what they were searching for on my blog, but I wanted to take the time to address these curious questions and concerns:

• Egg fried rice secret smell: There should be no secret smell to your fried rice. Maybe you’re using rotten eggs? Dishes that you serve really shouldn’t have secret smells. That’s totally gross.
• Burger shrink: Thank you, but my hamburgers are emotionally stable. No therapy needed.
• Horrid Chinese chicken: Most Chinese chickens are pretty nice. Sometimes if you get a mother hen that enjoys nagging and bossing chicks around, yes, then the hen might be a little horrid. But that’s nothing that a bottle of wine can’t handle. That’s how the Chinese came to invent the dish Drunken Chicken.
• White stuff that goes out of salmon: I don’t know … maybe the salmon has some sort of chickenpox? Bad case of acne? My advice: If your salmon has pus, don’t eat it. But how you landed on my site is a mystery. I’ve never written a recipe for diseased salmon.
• Chinese chicken cancer: Is this like the Beijing bird flu? Symptoms of the Chinese chicken cancer are: a sudden uncontrollable urge to peck at your computer screen; hair falling out in clumps, leaving you with a mohawk “comb”; strange feeling of wanting to sit on your computer mouse to keep it warm; and, lastly, waking up at the crack of dawn and scaring your mate by screeching “BAAAAKKKAAAACCCCKKKKKK!!!!!” You need professional help. None of my recipes will cure this. And for the rest of you, here’s a recipe for jap chae, the No. 10 most-popular search term on my site. The noodles used in this dish are made from sweet potato starch and become translucent when cooked, which is how they got their English name, “glass noodles.” They are also gluten-free and are wonderfully springy and light. You can use any type of fresh mushrooms, such as shiitake or even the standard button mushroom, but traditionally, dried wood ear mushrooms, found in most Asian markets, are used. Just rehydrate the mushrooms in warm water for 15 minutes, drain and they will be ready for your stir-fry. I love making this dish in the summertime because you can serve these noodles at room temperature or even slightly chilled. ***

This dish can also be spelled: Jab Chae, Chap Chae. The type of noodles used in this dish is made from sweet potato starch and translucent when cooked, which is how they got their English name, “glass noodles.” They are also gluten free and are wonderfully springy and light. I love making this dish in the summertime, because you can serve these noodles at room temperature or even slightly chilled.

You can find them at Asian markets or online at Komart. Just boil the dried noodles for 5 minutes, drain and toss with sesame oil so that they don’t stick together:

You can use any type of fresh mushrooms, like shitake or even the standard button mushroom, but traditionally, dried wood ear mushrooms, found in most Asian markets, are used. Just rehydrate the dried wood ear mushrooms in warm water for 15 minutes, drain and they’ll be ready for your stir-fry. The spinach was shy – didn’t want to jump in the group shot.

Stir fry the carrots and onions until softened, oh…about 1 minute…but it really depends on how thin you slice your onions and carrots:

Add garlic, scallions and mushrooms. Fry 30 seconds:

Then add spinach, noodles, soy sauce, sugar, fry 2-3 minutes until noodles are heated through. Turn off heat, toss with sesame seeds and remaining 1 1/2 tsp of sesame oil:

c

1/2 pound dried Korean sweet potato noodles 2 1/2 teaspoons sesame oil, divided 1 tablespoon cooking oil 3/4 cup thinly sliced onions 2 carrots, cut into matchsticks 2 cloves garlic, finely minced 3 stalks scallions, cut into 1″ lengths 1/2 cup mushrooms, thinly sliced (shitake, wood ear) 1/2 lb spinach, washed well and drained 2 tablespoons soy sauce 2 teaspoons sugar 1 tablespoon sesame seeds Fill a large pot with water and boil. When water is boiling, add the noodles and cook for 5 minutes. Immediately drain and rinse with cold water. Drain again and toss with only 1 tsp of the sesame oil. Use kitchen shears to cut noodles into shorter pieces, about 8 inches in length. Set aside. In bowl, mix soy sauce & sugar together. Add the cooking oil in a wok or large saute pan on high heat and swirl to coat. When the cooking oil is hot but not smoking. Fry onions and carrots, until just softened, about 1 minute. Add the garlic, scallions and mushrooms, fry 30 seconds. Then add the spinach, soy sauce, sugar and the noodles. Fry 2-3 minutes until the noodles are cooked through. Turn off heat, toss with sesame seeds and the remaining 1 1/2 tsp of sesame oil. *rehydrate your mushrooms if you are using dried

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If you’re not into the whole healthy vegetable thing, then you’ll love:

Con your kids to eating healthy, SteamyKitchen style

Garlic Scallion Noodles

Photo of Korean Glass Noodles – Jap Chae/Chap Chae

These past few days, I needed to cook healthy. Not for me, but for the sake of my children. You see, last week, I had Lasik eye surgery. As any reasonable mother would do, I milked it as far as I could go in terms of slacking on my housewifery duties. Laundry? bah..eyes too dry. Ironing? doc said no heavy lifting. Dishes? need to lay down to put in drops every 2 hours. Vacuuming? nope…can’t see squat after squirting in drops. Best to just sleep in every morning and let Scott handle the kids. It took 3 days before the kids confessed me what they’ve been eating for breakfast….

Breakfast of Champions Temper Tantrums

• 1 Double Fudge Pop-Tart
• A slice of white bread
• Water

Now. Let’s review, shall we? No. let’s not. You already know where I’m going with this. But then again, what was I thinking? I love my dear husband so very very much, but I certainly didn’t choose him for his eating habits.  I mean, this the guy that tops his Fritos with canned chili, spray-on cheese and calls it dinner, considers microwave butter popcorn a vegetable and hides a stash of chocolate breakfast bars at office and another in the front seat of his car so that he doesn’t have to share with the kids. Naturally, I took over the role as Frau Nutrition in our household and nudged my kids to embrace all sorts of vegetables – even brussels sprouts and salad. Now, don’t get me wrong, we eat our share of junk as evidenced by: Negative Calorie Chocolate Cake Chocolate & Dark Rum Tiramisu but I always make sure that we balance it out with healthy stuff too. All became undone those fateful mornings that I relinquished my morning duties. Despite the kitchen being stocked with soy milk, milk, juice, oatmeal, yogurt, whole-wheat bagels, eggs and fruit, those items were left untouched. Do you even know how many bushels of vegetables my kids have to eat to make up for 3 mornings of Pop Tarts, white bread and water?!? Where did those Pop Tarts come from in the first place?!? Does my husband have a contraband stash? (sigh) Just dig me a grave, boys.

  We took a little vacation this weekend to Marco Island – thanks to my sister-in-law who works for Marriott (now, that’s what I call RWB – relative with benefits) who got us a room overlooking the beach. It was a perfect mini-getaway. Thank you, R&M!

***

On to the recipe for healthy Korean noodles with tons of vegetables, Jap Chae (or Chap Chae).  The noodles are made from sweet potato starch, but taste NOTHING like sweet potatoes.  They are light in texture and color, making it a great flavor carrier for any type of vegetables and seasonings.

Korean Glass Noodles – Jap Chae

This dish can also be spelled: Jab Chae, Chap Chae. The type of noodles used in this dish is made from sweet potato starch and translucent when cooked, which is how they got their English name, “glass noodles.” They are also gluten free and are wonderfully springy and light. I love making this dish in the summertime, because you can serve these noodles at room temperature or even slightly chilled.

You can find them at Asian markets or online at Komart. Just boil the dried noodles for 5 minutes, drain and toss with sesame oil so that they don’t stick together:

You can use any type of fresh mushrooms, like shitake or even the standard button mushroom, but traditionally, dried wood ear mushrooms, found in most Asian markets, are used. Just rehydrate the dried wood ear mushrooms in warm water for 15 minutes, drain and they’ll be ready for your stir-fry. The spinach was shy – didn’t want to jump in the group shot.

Stir fry the carrots and onions until softened, oh…about 1 minute…but it really depends on how thin you slice your onions and carrots:

Add garlic, scallions and mushrooms. Fry 30 seconds:

Then add spinach, noodles, soy sauce, sugar, fry 2-3 minutes until noodles are heated through. Turn off heat, toss with sesame seeds and remaining 1 1/2 tsp of sesame oil:

***

If you’re not into the whole healthy vegetable thing, then you’ll love:

Garlic Scallion Noodles

***

More Korean Dishes

Korean BBQ Beef on Crispy Wonton Chip

Korean BBQ Kalbi (Short Ribs) and Bulgogi Recipe

This food blog thing really isn’t good for my waistline. B.B. (Before Blog), the little angel on my right shoulder and the devil on the left used to have a healthy debate, often lasting for a couple of minutes. “Poached Chicken Breast or Gorgonzola Stuffed Hamburger?” The playground was fair, the game was clean. Angel used to win, oh about 51% of the time. The game totally rigged now – sweet angel gently tugs on my ear, reminding me that I really should be cooking healthy tonight, something under 500 calories, light, refreshing, a mixed baby green salad perhaps. And all the little devil on my other side has to say is: “

Oh, its for the BLOG.”

POOF! the devil has won and without any consideration, the angel gets whacked in the head, pushed off my shoulder….she somehow ends up landing in the pile of carrot skin compost. Its totally insane that this blog is my reason for choosing to eat like a queen everyday. Its not like this little venture provides me with fame and fortune!

Korean BBQ

If you ask my friends what their favorite meal is at my home, the Korean BBQ Party wins, hands down. The meal itself isn’t that unhealthy, its just that Korean BBQ is so damn good that you just can’t refrain from stuffing yourself silly. Its also so incredibly easy too – the overnight marinade does all of the work, and you get all of the credit. There are 2 main types of beef in the Korean BBQ lineup: Kalbi (short ribs) & Bulgogi (thin slices of rib-eye). The marinated Kalbi gets thrown on the super-hot BBQ grill and the Bulgogi is cooked at the table on a portable butane-powered grill. You certainly could just cook it in your kitchen and bring it to the table to serve. I also have Kimchee (spicy, pickled cabbage/carrots) at the table, lettuce leaves and lots of white short-grained rice on the table.

KALBI are short ribs, cut on the cross-section (is that the right terminology?) They are thin 1/2″ slices of ribs that are marinated in soy sauce, brown sugar, pear juice, garlic, ginger and sesame oil. Every Korean family has their secret concoction for the marinade. But sometimes, I get lazy to create the marinade from scratch. I do the Sandra Lee thing…i know i know….(wince) just slap me for even mentioning her name…and use the marinade that comes in a jar + add freshly shredded carrots and onions. Get a good Korean brand (you can tell, usually the authentic stuff is in Korean, claims of using real pear juice on label (see below).

I promise you that it will taste mind-blowingly, lip-smackingly, soul-satisfyingly good.

This is Kalbi ready for the grill:

Store-bought Kimchee…because if I made Kimchee myself, dug a hole in the backyard to bury the Kimchee, the alligators that live 10 yards from my house would probably dig up the jar and try to eat it.

Headline: “Woman Kills Alligator with Kimchee” Anyways, I digress…..here is a Kimchee glamour shot:

And other banchan, or side dishes:

p.s. Did you know that the South Korean Ministry of Kimchee has developed an official scale for how fermented and spicy a Kimchee is? See Serious Eats for the article.

BULGOGI is paper-thin slices of rib-eye, marinated as well. I have a butane-powered little table-top grill: Inexpensive ($15 from Amazon) and it also is great for emergencies…like if we had a massive hurricane or flash flooding – we could totally still have our Korean BBQ Party!
A good hostess never lets a silly thing like a natural disaster ruin a party!. Grab the largest fry pan that you have (or a fancy griddle) – and now you have a table-top grill – everyone can cook their own Bulgogi. The Bulgogi marinade is slightly different from the Kalbi marinade – look at the jars and get one of each.

Step 1: fry a piece of Bulgogi

Step 2: lettuce in palm of hand, add rice, add Bulgogi, top with Kimchee

Step 3: eat Or, you could just skip the wrapping thing altogether:

What you need for Korean BBQ Party

The Meat
3-4 short rib slices per person
1/4 lb of Bulgogi per person
1 jar of Kalbi marinade
1 jar of Bulgogi marinade
1-2 carrots, shredded or julienned
1 julienned onion
2-4 stalks green onion, sliced in 1″ lengths
2-4 cloves garlic, minced

I get my meat from my local Asian market (the owner is Korean and he sells Kalbi and Bulgogi meat frozen. I defrost and marinate. Or you could go to your butcher and ask him to cut the short ribs for you. Instead of rib-eye, you could use thinly sliced flank steak or really any type of thinly sliced beef) – Combine marinade, some carrots/onion/green onion/garlic and Kalbi in large zip-top bag.

Do the same for the Bulgogi. Marinate the meat overnight, up to 3 days – Kalbi gets the BBQ grill treatment – Bulgogi is cooked at table

**Gluten free notes – while the marinade in the bottle is NOT gluten-free, I tagged this meal as Gluten-Free because it is easy enough to make your own marinade gluten-free. Hmmm…yeah. I should have just written the recipe for making the marinade from scratch….ok, I’ll do that soon. In meantime, just google for a recipe for the marinade and substitute with gluten-free soy sauce.

The Rice
Lots of white short grained rice (Korean or Japanese style) – I make enough rice to have 1-2 cups cooked rice per person. Here is a great 3-part tutorial on Korean Rice.

The Supporting Players
lettuce leaves (leafy, soft), kimchi, other picked radishes, salted seaweed sheets (you can use seaweed to wrap the meat instead of lettuce)

The Dessert Not Korean, but its the perfect soothing and cooling dessert after all the heat: Tapioca Pearls with Sweet Coconut Milk & Cantelope