First attempt at Korean food

The cooking has definitely decreased since I've been working.  I don't have the time to search for new recipes and new ideas so I've been making a lot of stuff that I've posted before so that explains the lack of posts.  Every now and then, though, I feel the need to make something new again and that's where this came from.

I decided to make Bibimbap.  It's basically a Korean rice bowl.  I got the idea for this in Bon Appetit magazine...I think.  It may have been Food and Wine.  Either way, it was from a magazine and it sounded good.  This was my first attempt at making Korean so I was a little worried it wouldn't go so well but everything sounded easy enough so I went for it.

This dish had a lot of components so it was a little time consuming but everything was really simple.  The ingredients were:

egg

rice

spinach

steak

carrots

zucchini

mushrooms

gochuchang 

medjool dates

sriracha

sesame oil

brown sugar

soy sauce

lime juice

So to start, I cut the steak into strips and marinaded it in a mix of brown sugar, soy sauce, sesame oil, and lime.  This sat for about 4 hours.  Since they were cut smaller, they took in the flavor much faster than if I had used whole steaks.  

About 30 minutes before dinner time, I started prepping everything else.  The "fixin's" can be made ahead of time and either eaten at room temp or reheated.  Rice went into a pot with some water until done.  I julienned the carrots and zucchini and then cooked them with some sesame oil, salt, and pepper.  The mushrooms went into a pot with some soy sauce, brown sugar, and sesame oil.  The sugar mix was cooked down until thickened and formed a glaze type consistency.  Then, I sprinkled some sesame seeds on them and mixed it all together.  The spinach was cooked with oil until wilted and then sprinkled with salt.  To make gochuchang paste, I bought some pre-made paste.  I chopped and pitted the dates and then they went into a food processor with the paste and sriracha until it was all combined. The steak was cooked in the pan with the marinade and right before serving, I fried the eggs.

This meal was really good! There's rice underneath all of those toppings.  We cracked the egg and let it run all over and then mixed the whole thing up.  It's definitely a lot prettier before the mixing happens.  The gochuchang paste had just the right amount of heat.  

I know..I know...

I know I keep saying that I'm gonna be better about posting and then I never am =/  The Christmas rush at work is over but yet I'm still always too tired to update my blog at the end of the day. The past few weeks have been a little slow at the house due to Eric and I both being sick.  The cooking slowed down and the ordering delivery food and getting take out increased to a record high.  I did feel well enough to make Christmas dinner though.  I've never been home for Christmas since I was an adult so this was the first dinner I made at home.  It was nice to have Eric here so I didn't have to spend it alone.  We decided to do Christmas dinner on Christmas Eve so we could ski on Christmas day. Our menu consisted of:

charcuterie and cheese platter

prime rib

mashed potatoes

brussel sprouts

yorkshire pudding

key lime fruit tart

The pictures are little lacking but I've made all of these things before except for the yorkshire pudding.  I didn't really know what to expect but it was definitely interesting to say the least, and pretty good when paired with everything else.  

I work next to a cheese and charcuterie store and since it was Christmas, I felt it would be nice to have some appetizers before dinner.  I purchased the small platter since it was just the 2 of us and it ended up being much more than enough.  

The prime rib went into the oven at 500F for about 15 minutes and then I decreased the oven to 325F and let it cook to a medium rare.  It came out quite perfectly I think.  I didn't do anything special with the mashed potatoes or brussel sprouts.  The sprouts were just roasted with olive oil, salt, and pepper.  To make yorkshire pudding, the remaining drippings from the prime rib were put into muffin tins, about 1/6 of a cup into each muffin cup.  The tin is then put into the oven at 450F until the drippings are steaming hot.  I made the batter a few hours earlier and let it sit for about 30 minutes at room temp.  The batter is consisted of:

flour

egg

sugar

baking powder

It looks a lot like pancake batter when it's done. The batter is then poured into the heated oil and the whole tin is put back into the oven for about 20 minutes, until they rise A LOT.  You can't tell how tall they are in the pictures but they're at least 6 inches tall and hollow.  I also made a horseradish sauce with horseradish, sour cream, and lemon juice.  

Eric loves key lime pie and we both love fruit tarts so I thought it would be a good idea to mix the two into one.  I'm not really sure what happened but for some reason, my tart fell completely apart when I tried to take it off the bottom round from the tart pan.  Luckily, I still got it home somehow and it was still delicious. 

Needless to say, we didn't get to finish all of this food and we still have some leftovers but the dinner was great! It was a great Christmas meal and cost significantly less than what we would've spent at a restaurant.