Post by macmex on Dec 26, 2021 10:44:58 GMT -6
Hank gave us some beautiful cabbages from his garden and I've been meaning to make kimchi. It took until Christmas for me to find a little time to work on this. Here's a picture of the kimchi I mixed up this morning. It will need several weeks of cool storage for it to ferment and be really ready, but the hardest part is done.
First of all, for those who don't already know, kimchi is a a Korean pickled food, generally consisting cabbage, carrots, onions, garlic and hot peppers. There are variations in the recipe of course. Some folk make kimchi with cucumbers, which might be good. I've just never tried it.
Jerreth and I have made kimchi for ourselves since around 1989. Here's my story about kimchi.
I (we) first encountered kimchi while attending Grace Theological Seminary, in WInona Lake, Indiana. We lived in a trailer park which housed a good many college and seminary students. We also had quite the international community on account of the schools. While living in that trailer park we developed wonderful relationships with Guatemalan, Singaporean, and Korean neighbors.
We had Korean neighbors on either side of our trailer lot. In both cases the men attended seminary with me and the wives had outside jobs. We received a wonderful introduction to Korean culture through these neighbors. Our neighbors quickly picked up on the fact that Jerreth and I both loved trying new foods and learning about other cultures. At one point, I went over to one of these neighbors to borrow a book we needed for one of our classes. He met me at the door with the book and a forkful of the strangest stuff. He called it kimchi and insisted that I "open up" and eat it before he'd hand me the book. I needed to borrow that book, or another on several occasions that year. Each time I arrived on the door, he met me, armed with a forkful of kimchi.
The first time I took a bite, I though maybe I had fallen for some kind of practical joke. The taste didn't fit much of anything I was familiar with. It was hot, spicy and salty. It reeked of A LOT of garlic. I chewed and swallowed (to get the book) and observed that my neighbor, though smiling, didn't appear to think he'd just pulled one off on me. He explained that Koreans eat a lot of it and that I'd learn to like it.
Well, after several doses of kimchi I started to look forward to it. This was back in the 1980s, and kimchi was not available in the grocery store. I'm sure my neighbors made their own.
I graduated from seminary and we moved away, first to NJ, then to South Texas, to study Spanish, and eventually to Central Mexico, to begin serving in missions. We first landed in a very rural area of the Mexican State of Puebla, in a high cold rain forest environment. Life there was VERY different from what we knew. During the first six months living there we went through extreme culture shock. Among the areas of adjustment was that of diet. Wheat products were pretty scarce. We soon felt kind of maxed out on corn (tortillas, tamales, etc.). Though the area was rich in vegetables, we were not familiar with many of them. We didn't understand how to get veggies and soon felt an acute lack of greens. It was then that it occurred to me that kimchi would taste really good and meet that need. But I had no recipe and had never gotten one from our Korean friends.
Back then we were subscribed to Gardens for All which later became the National Gardening Association. So I wrote in and asked other members for kimchi recipes. Within a few months we were swimming in recipes and I delightedly started experimenting with them. This is the essential recipe, which is hard to improve.
Cut up a medium size head of cabbage
chop into pieces:
3 medium onions
4 carrots
4-6 cloves of garlic
3 or 4 jalepeños
Add about 1/2 teaspoon of ground ginger and about the same of black pepper.
Mix everything together by hand, adding salt until everything tastes salty.
Pack into a glass jar and store in a cool place for two or three weeks before eating.
The proportion of ingredients is flexible, and some batches are better than others, but honestly, I've always loved this dish.
Interestingly, though Mexicans didn't have a niche in their palette for pickles (I've seen a Mexican throw up after eating a pickle), we never saw a Mexican try kimchi and not like it. Everyone liked it!
A decade later we were visiting in the USA and some Korean friends took us out to a Korean restaurant. It was then I learned that Koreans usually serve kimchi as a garnish, to eat with rice and other food. I hadn't known that. So, I generally just served myself up a bowl and ate it straight. I'm sure this brought a smile and chuckle to the hearts of our Korean friends.
So today I made another batch and remembered good friends and times past.
First of all, for those who don't already know, kimchi is a a Korean pickled food, generally consisting cabbage, carrots, onions, garlic and hot peppers. There are variations in the recipe of course. Some folk make kimchi with cucumbers, which might be good. I've just never tried it.
Jerreth and I have made kimchi for ourselves since around 1989. Here's my story about kimchi.
I (we) first encountered kimchi while attending Grace Theological Seminary, in WInona Lake, Indiana. We lived in a trailer park which housed a good many college and seminary students. We also had quite the international community on account of the schools. While living in that trailer park we developed wonderful relationships with Guatemalan, Singaporean, and Korean neighbors.
We had Korean neighbors on either side of our trailer lot. In both cases the men attended seminary with me and the wives had outside jobs. We received a wonderful introduction to Korean culture through these neighbors. Our neighbors quickly picked up on the fact that Jerreth and I both loved trying new foods and learning about other cultures. At one point, I went over to one of these neighbors to borrow a book we needed for one of our classes. He met me at the door with the book and a forkful of the strangest stuff. He called it kimchi and insisted that I "open up" and eat it before he'd hand me the book. I needed to borrow that book, or another on several occasions that year. Each time I arrived on the door, he met me, armed with a forkful of kimchi.
The first time I took a bite, I though maybe I had fallen for some kind of practical joke. The taste didn't fit much of anything I was familiar with. It was hot, spicy and salty. It reeked of A LOT of garlic. I chewed and swallowed (to get the book) and observed that my neighbor, though smiling, didn't appear to think he'd just pulled one off on me. He explained that Koreans eat a lot of it and that I'd learn to like it.
Well, after several doses of kimchi I started to look forward to it. This was back in the 1980s, and kimchi was not available in the grocery store. I'm sure my neighbors made their own.
I graduated from seminary and we moved away, first to NJ, then to South Texas, to study Spanish, and eventually to Central Mexico, to begin serving in missions. We first landed in a very rural area of the Mexican State of Puebla, in a high cold rain forest environment. Life there was VERY different from what we knew. During the first six months living there we went through extreme culture shock. Among the areas of adjustment was that of diet. Wheat products were pretty scarce. We soon felt kind of maxed out on corn (tortillas, tamales, etc.). Though the area was rich in vegetables, we were not familiar with many of them. We didn't understand how to get veggies and soon felt an acute lack of greens. It was then that it occurred to me that kimchi would taste really good and meet that need. But I had no recipe and had never gotten one from our Korean friends.
Back then we were subscribed to Gardens for All which later became the National Gardening Association. So I wrote in and asked other members for kimchi recipes. Within a few months we were swimming in recipes and I delightedly started experimenting with them. This is the essential recipe, which is hard to improve.
Cut up a medium size head of cabbage
chop into pieces:
3 medium onions
4 carrots
4-6 cloves of garlic
3 or 4 jalepeños
Add about 1/2 teaspoon of ground ginger and about the same of black pepper.
Mix everything together by hand, adding salt until everything tastes salty.
Pack into a glass jar and store in a cool place for two or three weeks before eating.
The proportion of ingredients is flexible, and some batches are better than others, but honestly, I've always loved this dish.
Interestingly, though Mexicans didn't have a niche in their palette for pickles (I've seen a Mexican throw up after eating a pickle), we never saw a Mexican try kimchi and not like it. Everyone liked it!
A decade later we were visiting in the USA and some Korean friends took us out to a Korean restaurant. It was then I learned that Koreans usually serve kimchi as a garnish, to eat with rice and other food. I hadn't known that. So, I generally just served myself up a bowl and ate it straight. I'm sure this brought a smile and chuckle to the hearts of our Korean friends.
So today I made another batch and remembered good friends and times past.
