Preparation Takes a Little Time

Hello, Aloha, Bonjour, 안녕 or whatever greeting you prefer! It's been a wee while, hasn't it. I started a second blog a while back, where this post first appeared, but I missed the ol' Paper Elephant so I'm shifting everything onto this blog whilst I give the old girl a much needed facelift!!

 So here we go, ten months into my Korean adventure (at the time of writing), I bring you some of my kimbap know-how.

Kimbap (김밥) is very similar in appearance to Japanese sushi. It is not sushi. Not even a little bit. For a start, there's no raw fish involved, there can be no fish at all, but that depends on your personal preference. It's a hugely popular item in Korea, finding it's way into lunch boxes in place of sandwiches and is pretty healthy too. Yes, it may have a hefty amount of rice in it, but that too is down to personal preference and no one ever said you HAD to use the white variety.

The downside to kimbap, is the prep time. It can take a wee while to get your ingredients prepared and set out (also dependant on how many ingredients you want to put into your kimbap and how readily available some ingredients are (the primary example here being burdock, which I never remember seeing EVER in a British supermarket, but I can't imagine my Kimbap without it!)

Before we can even think about making kimbap, we need some lists:

Essentials:

• Rice (this can be white, brown, purple whatever. So long as it has a modicum of stickyness. When I was taught to make kimbap, my friend actually used a combination of rices, cooked together)
• Yellow Radish
• Burdock
• Carrot
• Cucumber
• Ham
• Kim / Seaweed (very important as this is what you wrap the kimbap in)
• Soy Sauce
• Sesame Oil
• Honey
• Salt

Optionals:

• Fish cake. Of the Korean variety. This is a flat, floppy rectangle that is made of ground fish I guess. Personally, for me this is in the Essential list, but as not everyone is a fan of our friends from the sea, I'm putting it here. On a side note, fish in Korean is 물고기 which literally translates as 'water meat'. It's one of my favourite words! 

• Fish sticks. Much the same as the fish sticks you get in the UK. Pink things with white in the middle. I don't mind them, but I don't go out of my way to use them. I forgot them one day and didn't notice the difference.

• Egg. In the form of the thinnest of thin omelettes.

• Side dishes. Now, I don't know the name of all them (bar the ever present kimchi) but any number of these can be added to you kimbap depending on your personal preference.

Variations: 

The options here are endless, but here are a few suggestions:

• Tuna. Replace the ham with tuna. You can add a wee bit of mayonnaise if you like, but you have to make sure it's not too runny, or it can be such a bind to wrap.

• Bulgogi. This is a marinated meat, most often beef.

• Or you can be really adventurous and make your own combinations. This year, for Christmas, in lew of a Christmas Dinner, I made Christmas Kimbap. It consited of chicken (poached) cranberry stuffing, vichy carrots and a token green vegetable (I think it was pak choi). If I repeated this, I'd probably use lettuce, but I was please with the end result and it definitely tasted of Christmas!)

Utensils: 

Bar the obvious, here are some things I have found invaluable when it comes to making kimbap.

• Sushi/kimbap roller. You honestly HAVE to have one of these!

• Brush. A pastry brush will do, to brush your kimbap and knife with sesame oil to make slicing it easier - honestly this makes all the difference in the world. It took me a while to be able to slice my kimbap without the filling splurging out all over the place. 

• Tray. This is a very useful piece of kit. when I prep my ingredients, I like to lay out what I'm using on a tray. I then cling film it up when I'm done and fire it into the fridge. This way, one day of prep means the kimbap is ready to go any time. It also makes the assembly line quicker when the ingredients are in one place.

• Rice Scoop. This isn't necessary at all, but I find it useful to gauge quantities of rice and it flattens/spreads the rice out well.

Phew!! You made it to the end! Congratulations! Kimbap really is all about the preparation, but I promise you it's so worth it!

I'll give you time to digest all of this (digest.... get it... ah I'm too funny................... or not) and I will return later to show you how to turn this:

into this: