nanoomi

After making tofu and soy milk at home, my experiments to utilize an inordinate amount of soy pulp (비지; bi ji or okara) began.  In addition to biji jjigae (비지 찌개; stew made with soy pulp, kimchi and pork as main ingredients), I found a way to put soy pulp in mini zucchini cupcakes, where it adds a soft crunch and subtle nutty flavor.

This time, soy pulp finds its way into butter cookies.

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The brilliance of making tofu at home was suggested by my friends who were already making their own, but it took me a while to get on it as it seemed like such an arduous task.  Yet once I started, I made five batches one after another.  And then a couple more.  Then another… Its taste and texture remind me of ricotta cheese, but, obviously, made with soybeans.

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Last weekend was quite hectic, filled with pleasant surprises, new and old friends, and lots of (thoughts, plans, preparations, and consumption of) food, food, food.  It started with Korea Day on Friday, my dear friends’ wedding on Saturday, and finally a day of new yet familiar experiences on Sunday.

On Sunday, people from tvK, a Korean cable station based in L.A., came out to my place to interview me about Korean food and my blog and to film my cooking for a dinner gathering with friends, as part of a documentary they are making about Koreans in the U.S. and Korean food.

The first change after my sister and I heard the news of tvK’s visit was totally unrelated to food.  Within a day, my sister’s giant backpack sitting at the corner of the room for the last two months was removed.  This meant that something else had to be moved to make room for the backpack, which resulted in cleaning and reorganizing the whole apartment…just to hide one giant backpack.

As for food, the main focus, I wanted to prepare dishes for my friends who already know the basic items of Korean food and have done bulgogi and galbi BBQ many times over.  I wanted my friends to try something different, something that they wouldn’t know to order or might not find at a Korean restaurant, but still familiar, homey Korean flavors, with, of course, my own spin.

So here is how it went.

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By Kathy Fidler

Juinun Beantown, Goyang

On the northwestern edge of the city, about halfway to Ilsan on subway line three, there is a suburb called Goyang that is home to a wonderful little cluster of farms and specialty restaurants. There’s an herb farm, a mushroom farm, the tipsily entertaining Baedari Tradtional Wine Museum and makgeolli brewery, and outdoor grill restaurants specializing in just about any kind of meat you can imagine.

Up the road from all of these locations is a complex with the English name Beantown, housing a bean farm, a coffee house, a shop selling an impressive variety of homemade soybean pastes (doenjang) and chili paste (gochujang), as well as the only live turkey I’ve ever seen in the Seoul metropolitan area. Front and center in this delightful complex is a restaurant serving foods produced on the farm.

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