The Origin of Kimchi
Korea has its own distinctive aroma. What is this fragrance of Korea, and where does it come from?
The fragrance of a country or region comes mainly from the local cuisine, which derives its unique savor from particular spices, fermented foods and liquids, or ways of cooking with all of these. The dishes that give Korea its special fragrance are primarily fermented foods, especially the various kinds of kimchi made with fermented vegetables and the various kinds of paste made with fermented beans. Above all, it is the pungent smell of kimchi that first assaults the senses of the visitor to Korea.
However, those who get accu-stomed to the strong flavor of kimchi soon find that they can't get enough of it. Moreover, kimchi is becoming more and more popular as its health-giving properties come to be better understood.
For instance, there is a growing interest in the efficacy of kimchi in preventing geriatric disorders, and the high fiber content of its main ingredients, vegetables and red chili, helps keep obesity at bay.
There are more kinds of kimchi in Korea than there are cheeses in France. Indeed, there are so many varieties that no one knows them all. One university professor has identified more than 100 different ingredients used in making kimchi, 36 of them used as main ingredients. And since these ingredients are combined and matured a little differently in each kind of kimchi and in each family tradition, it is impossible to say exactly how many varieties of kimchi exist.
The culture of a region develops as the people who live there adapt to the natural environment, especially after they begin to practice agriculture.
Unlike Western or African cuisine, Korean cooking makes a clear distinction between main dishes and side dishes. Rice and other grains form the staple of the main dishes, which are enjoyed all the more through the accompaniment of side dishes made of vegetables, salted seafood, fish, or meat.
To ensure a supply of food through the long Korean winter, vegetables and fish began to be preserved, at first probably by drying. However, it was also found possible to pickle vegetables in seawater, and it is thought that as the supply of salt became relatively reliable, people learned how to keep vegetables fresh for long periods by salting. The earliest documentary evidence is found in China's first anthology of poetry, the Book of Odes, which is believed to have been compiled between 2,600 and 3,000 years ago. In this book appears a Chinese character meaning salting, which shows that a prototype of kimchi already existed at this early date. But the alchemy of making kimchi came to be more highly developed in Korea than in China, and the reason lies in the natural environment.
The visitor to Korea cannot fail to be impressed by the wide, fertile tidal flats that stretch along the southwestern coast. These mudflats teem with life all year round, and except in mid-winter, they provide a food source that can be harvested even without modern equipment.
Although the basis of kimchi is the lactic-acid fermentation of vegetables pickled in salt, the liberal addition of fish and seafood can assist the fermentation process and provide nutrients that would otherwise be scarce in winter, such as protein and calcium.
The Korean people suffered greatly from the lack of food until about the mid-1960s. Since then, the amazing growth of the Korean economy has raised the annual income per capita to $10,000, yet compared to other countries of a similar income level, it is surprising how few Koreans are overweight. Many believe that the explanation lies in the fact that Koreans eat a lot of kimchi.
They point out that kimchi contains a high proportion of fiber (from the vegetables), capsaicin which is said to burn fat (from the chili), generous amounts of calcium (from the salted seafood), appropriate quantities of high-grade protein (from fish and seafood), and an abundance of vitamins (from the vegetables). They also worry about the increasing incidence of obesity among the younger generation who tend to eschew kimchi in favor of imported instant foods.
Comments
Thanks, Alexa
However, my first comment on this, I added a recipe as you can adopt and make it for your own taste. Some people think the commercial products are too spicy like my wife, so she cooks her own way for us. As for me, I don't mind it at all as long as she put Kimchi on every meal table for us.
Thank you for your blog post. Kimchi is very good taste. I have ever try it before and i like it very much. I don't think i can make it by myself. So, it's better to buy Kimchi from the mall in Thailand or take a airplane to South Korea :))
Thanks for your interesting of Korean Kimchi!
When my mother used to have stayed with evey 6 months in UK, she used to make it regularly and it was a real Korean kimchi. And now my wife has regularly been cooking this kimchi whenever we finished it all. So if we eat any Korean foods with rice, this Kimchi must be on the table without any hesitation or second thought. Yamee, yamee yamee. My daily foods!!!
I prefer a little fermanted kimchi to the fresh one, and if it's too fermented and it smells very stong, we don't throw it away but make a soup with some meat (port or beef) more chinese cabbage with garlic (a little more), sugar (we use sweetner), some more of chilli paste and sesame oil (this is a very important one. It makes more tasty, and stimulates your appetite more). Then boil it.
Bon appetit!!!
Goody goody! Please let me know how that taste would be lik. I hope that you could make it successfully as same tasty as possible. Good luck to you!
Nothing in the world is easier than making kimchi, yet nothing is more difficult. Even a novice can rinse the vegetables clean, salt them, rinse them again the next day, add garlic, and leave them in a cool place for a day or two to ferment naturally, then eat them just as they are. That's all there is to it. Yet making the best and most nutritious kimchi is a high art accessible only to the seasoned specialist. Thus, although almost every Korean housewife knows how to make kimchi, few can claim to make it at its very best.
Here is how to make the popular cabbage pickle known as tong kimchi, one of the varieties of winter pickles which are most widely consumed in Korea.
Ingredients and Properties :
Main ingredients : 2 heads Chinese cabbage, 1 medium-size white radish
Flavorings : 60g mustard greens, 80g watercress, 70g green onions, 40g cheonggak seaweed(glue plant), 2 heads of garlic, peeled, 1/2 ginger root (based on the size of Korean or Japanese ginger, which is smaller than tropical or subtropical ginger), 1/2 Asian pear, 1 chestnut, 120g raw oysters, 1/3 cup salted shrimp, Salted corvina, or 1 fresh pollack (1/4 cod can be substituted), 2/3 cup chili flakes (it is best not to use the very spicy chili produced in Southeast Asia, but if no other kind is available, reduce the quantity to 1/10), 2 tablespoons dry chili strips, 1 cup salt
The above flavorings are the best, but some may be hard to find when they are out of season, and it is acceptable to omit the mustard greens, watercress, cheonggak, pear, chestnut, salted corvina, or fresh pollack. The remaining ingredients are essential.
1. Dissolve the salt in 5 cups water.
2. Remove (but do not discard) the outer leaves of the cabbage, rinse it clean, and trim it to shape.
3. In the evening, soak the prepared cabbage in the salt water, then remove it and pile it up in a jar or plastic container. 3-4 hours later, turn it upside down. Early in the morning, rinse the cabbage, drain it, and cut it in half.
4 .That evening, rinse and trim the white radish, green onions, mustard greens, and cheonggak. Soak the watercress in water. Cut about half the white radish into thin strips and the rest into pieces about 6cm long and 1cm thick to use as packing.
5. Mix the packing radish with a little salt and chili flakes and set it aside.
6. Soak the shelled oysters in lightly salted water. Cut the watercress and mustard greens into pieces about 4cm long. Finely chop the white parts of the green onions.
7. Cut the garlic and ginger into thin strips.
8. Peel and thinly slice the chestnut, and cut the pear into thin strips.
9. Mix the chili flakes with the strips of white radish in a large bowl. Add the salted shrimp and the other flavorings you have prepared as above, and mix well.
The above flavorings are the best, but some may be hard to find when they are out of season, and it is acceptable to omit the mustard greens, watercress, cheonggak, pear, chestnut, salted corvina, or fresh pollack. The remaining ingredients are essential.
1. Spread this filling between the leaves of the cabbage. Fold the leaves toward the stem to enclose the filling.
2. To the packing prepared in #4, add the minced garlic, ginger watercress, finely chopped mustard greens, and a little of the liquid from a jar of salted shrimp or other salted fish, and mix together.
3. Put a little of the packing in a pot and pile the stuffed cabbage on top of it, adding a little more packing after each layer of cabbage. Repeat until the jar is about 80% full, then top with the outer leaves of the cabbage and weight the kimchi with a flat stone.