Properly Washing Rice (and bonus tutorial on the onion spectrum)

In this edition of "Not Your Mother's Kitchen", Leigh will show you the "how-to" of perfect North Asian sticky rice and a bonus tutorial of the different kinds of onions from the large bold flavored white onions common in Western cuisine to the delicate chives. Yes, there is a difference between spring onion and green onion and she'll show you how.

Incheon’s Munhak Stadium offers fans 'tailgating' option

If you want to enjoy your own Korean BBQ with your small group of friends, consider renting space at Munhak Baseball Stadium's BBQ Zone in Incheon. They provide the grilling space and the heat, you provide the BBQ, fixings and fellowship. (Tammy Quackenbush photo)

Americans invented the tailgate party, where fans congregate in stadium and arena parking lots to grill their own food and drink their own beer, rather than pay the exorbitant cost of food and drink in the venue. 

Koreans now can host their own style of tailgaters. At Incheon's Munhak Baseball Stadium (home of the SK Wyverns team), fans can get ample helpings of baseball and do-it-yourself barbecue and banchan (side dishes) at a reasonable price, according to JoongAng Daily's Lee Suk-hee:

The BBQ Zone is the most popular area of the stadium with fans. From this year, people are allowed to bring in their own meat and cook it over a grill while watching the game for only 60,000 won for four people.

At 15,000 won a person (US$13.87 as of April 26), that's on par with a good meal at a restaurant, compared with approaching $10 for a basic hot dog at some American venues.

To reserve space in the BBQ Zone, you have to contact the stadium for a reservation, either online (Korean: ticket.interpark.com) or by phone at (02)1544-1555.

Recipes with 유자 yuja (Asian citron) on YouTube

Yuja, also called Yuzu in Japanese, is a very exotic ingredient to most Westerners. Most Americans have never seen the fruit up close and personal since fresh yuja imports from Japan or Korea are forbidden by US law to protect our own citrus crops from possible insect infestations.

Most Koreans consume Yuja in one form: as a drink. Koreans don't usually eat the fruit raw.

I want to expand the yuja's culinary use beyond the ubiquitous hot drink known as yujacha. So  far, I have posted 8 different recipes at Koreafornian cooking using the lemony yuja as the primary flavor including the following.

1. Yujacha hamataschen. This is my Korean spin on a centuries-old Jewish cookie called Hamantashen.  Hamantashen are triangle-shaped cookies filled with dried fruit or chocolate and traditionally eaten during the Jewish festival of Purim.

2. Yuja chicken. This recipe enlivens a Chinese American restaurant favorite — orange chicken — with tangier citron and zippier Korean hot red pepper.

3. Yuja butter. A compound butter is a butter that has additional flavors, herbs, etc. added to it. I mixed yujacha and butter for a tart, citrus compliment for scones, muffins, fruit cake or nut breads.

4. Yuja scones. For most Americans, scones are for high tea or Easter Sunday brunches—very British and very proper. Throw off the British rules and have them for a dessert or a mid-afternoon snack (with or without black tea and cream).

5. French Toast with Yujacha syrup. French toast goes back to Roman times, making it one of the first "egg toast" dishes in recorded history. I've found that yujacha syrup and French toast complement each other very well.

6. Yujacha Salmon. A simple glaze that will add a zippy tang to your salmon. It also makes an excellent dipping sauce for chicken strips or spring rolls.

7. Yujacha Rolls. These rolls are inspired by cinnamon rolls and are quicker to prepare than Yujacha Hamantashen but use the same filling.

8. Yuja curd, which is a yuja twist on the English classic lemon curd. This would make an excellent accompaniment to any sweet breakfast food such as scones, granola, English muffins,or cheese blintzes. You can also use the yuja curd to make your own Yuja meringue pie.

At this point, you may think my love affair with (유자) yujacha has become an obsession.

If I am obsessed, I want everyone in my audience to benefit from it. I will be posting several more yuja recipes on my blog in the near future. Please subscribe to the RSS feed of my blog or "like" me on Facebook at http://www.facebook.com/KoreafornianCooking and be the first to discover my newest recipes and Korean food news from around the world.

Five Essential Korean Ingredients

This vlog, made by Leigh Cooper of unlikelysquiggle.com, is a good, 5 minute tutorial on the bare essentials of the Korean pantry.

Recipe: Korean Charoset

Korean pear charoset paired up with some matzah, romaine lettuce and horseradish spiked with beet juice, for the perfect Hillel Sandwich. (Tammy Quackenbush photo)

Last year, I posted a recipe for charoset that was decided non-Korean. This year, I decided to rectify that by making a Korean-style charoset for you. I took my new charoset recipe to our annual Passover seder and it was a big hit.

As I said last Passover,

The traditional Ashkenazi Haroset features apples, raisins, cinnamon and walnuts. I can't put my finger on the reason that this version of Haroset sets my teeth on edge, but I don't find it remotely appealing. ...I don't like raisins at all.   No amount of cinnamon, sugar or walnuts can change that. I call them "shriveled up, dead fruit." I'm also not a big fan of apples, at least as the main actor, either.

I still dabble in apples, only in extreme moderation (usually slathered in peanut butter), so this charoset does not use apples. Instead, the Korean pear holds center stage.

Korean Pear Charoset

Ingredients
1-2 Korean pears, peeled, cored, and finely diced
1 1/2 cups walnut halves, pre-soaked and dehydrated and coarsely chopped
2 tbsp honey
2 tbsp yuja or lemon juice
1 1/2 tsp cinnamon or Chinese five spice powder
1 tbsps packed brown sugar

Directions

Mix all the ingredients in a large bowl well and allow them to mingle for a few hours (or a day) before serving.

Charoset

Vote for my next Korean (or Koreafornian) recipe

Are you longing to do something new in the kitchen? Check out my Facebook page for some inspiration.

Do you have a Korean ingredient lurking in your pantry, waiting to be used? Have no idea what to do with it? Or are you bored with your regular recipes and want to take a particular ingredient in a different direction?

For example, with the humble cylindrical rice cake, 가래떡 garae tteok, I made 12 different dishes. Together, we can create new recipes.

Visit my Facebook page for Koreafornian Cooking, "like" it and vote for your favorite Korean ingredient or the ingredient that most perplexes you. If your ingredient is not listed, add your own. Ask your Facebook friends to vote, too, so we have as much input as possible. The ingredient with the most votes will be my next recipe on Koreafornian Cooking.

How to celebrate Pesach (Passover) in Korea in 2011

The Hebrew word chametz includes yeast and other leavening products and bread products made with those products, such as bread, tortillas, cakes and scones. Chabad of Korea can help you deal with these items appropriately. (Tammy Quackenbush photo of Yujacha Scones)

If you're of the Chosen in 조선 Joseon (a Jew living in Korea) and wondering what to do and where to go for פסח Pesach (Passover, which begins the evening of April 18), contact Chabad of Korea. The Jewish outreach organization has been in Korea since 2008.

Matzah is the Hebrew word for unleavened bread. It's a simple mix of wheat flour and water that is baked within 18 minutes after the flour and water come together. (Jeff Quackenbush photo)

Through Chabad you can order מצה matzah (unleavened bread eaten during the seven-day festival), sell your חמץ chametz (leavened and leavening items such as bread and yeast) and sign up for a seder (Pesach observance meal) so you can celebrate Pesach with other Jews.

Rabbi Litzman said, "There is no deadline at all," for putting in your order but be realistic and put in your order as soon as possible to have it in time for Pesach.

Tuna Kimchi Jjigae (참치김치찌개)

This has been my go-to kimchi jjigage recipe for more than 10 years. (Tammy Quackenbush photo)

Northern Californian winters are all about cold dampness — rain, lots of rain. For me, the only purpose for winter is to get the full benefit of a hot bowl of 김치찌개 kimchi jjigae, or kimchi stew. That's a dish Koreans commonly make to finish off a jar of kimchi that has become too sour and mostly "juice," the tangy, spicy, flavorful remnant of pickling.

Kimchi jjigae with 돼지고기 dwaegi gogi (pork), Spam processed ham or 두부 dubu (tofu), are common variations of the dish. Avoiding pork for religious reasons, I was pleased to find 참치김치찌개 chamchi kimchi jjigae, or kimchi stew with tuna, on the menu of a restaurant near Kangwon National University in Chuncheon, a lakeside city in the mountains northeast of Seoul. I first tasted that version in the mid-'90s and have been making it ever since.

Korean grocery stores sell canned tuna specially made for kimchi jjigae, marinated in 고추장 gochujang (Korean red pepper paste). Because tuna is usually chunk light tuna, which has a smell and flavor, albacore canned tuna is my tuna of choice. (But I may have to reconsider after reading this Epicurious article about mercury in albacore.)

Since most canned tuna isn't packed in gochujang, I add gochujang or 고추가루gochugaru (Korean red pepper flakes or powder) to the stew. Gochujang will make the stew thicker; gochugaru, thinner.

Tuna Kimchi Jjigae

makes 1-2 servings

1 teaspoon grapeseed or other oil with a high-temperature smoke point
1 cup chopped kimchi
1 can white albacore tuna, packed in water
2 garlic cloves, minced
2 cups kimchi "juice" (top off with fish or chicken broth)
1 teaspoon Japanese dashi powder
1-2 teaspoons Korean gochujang or gochugaru (to your taste)
1 teaspoon sesame oil

1. Heat the pan, and add the oil. Saute the chopped kimchi and garlic until the kimchi barely becomes soft.

2. Add the water, dashi and gochujang/gochugaru and allow the mixture to boil for 10 to 15 minutes.

3. Add the tuna — it's already fully cooked — and continue to boil for about five more minutes.

4. Add the sesame oil immediately before serving so the flavor comes through.

5. Serve it with a grilled cheese sandwich — try my version with kimchi — for a Koreafornian spin on the classic tomato soup combo.

Tuna

Kimchi Jigae 김치 찌개

Another enemy of your garden: hail

A hailstorm visited my house in Northern California on March 24, 2011 in the late afternoon. I don't think my very young basil plants are going to survive this. (Tammy Quackenbush photo from iPhone)

There's one garden enemy I forgot to touch on in my recent post about gardening: hail.

For more information on how hail can damage your precious produce and flowers read "How to recover my plants after hail damage?" at ehow.com. There's also an article on the same site with tips on preventing hail damage.

April 5th: Korean Arbor Day

I have search far and wide for a yuja/yuzu tree to plant in my yard to no avail. Maybe next year. (Tammy Quackenbush photo)

CHOW Tip: What Is Miner's Lettuce?

Iso Rabins, founder of forageSF, introduces one of his favorite leafy greens: miner's lettuce, a native of California. It's easy for amateur foragers to identify it, whether foraging in the wild or at the market.

Although Miner's Lettuce is a native plant found all the way from Alaska to to Central America, it's most commonly found in Northern and Central California. It can be used as a substitute for spinach in salads and other dishes. It comes into season towards the end of California's rainy season (which lasts from October to April).

If you aren't able to find it wild, you can plant your own.