Saturday, February 6, 2010

Yum-City

--To answer Audie and Necha's question, Kimchi is ferminted cabbage leaves mixed with other spices, I believe it's a Korean food staple. I've always wanted to try cooking with it, so when I saw it at Winco, I bought a can.


I'm trying to integrate more vegetarian meals into the meal plan lately. So, I recently purchased tofu for the first time in many many years. I've eaten tofu before, but never really cooked with it. So, in an effort to test it out, I just made this soup for lunch. DELISH!!! If you like Asian cuisine, try this soup, you won't be disappointed. Plus, it's good for you.

Kimchi Soup with Tofu and Spinach

- serves 4 -

Ingredients

3 tablespoons sesame oil
6 scallions, chopped
1 1/2 cups kimchi, chopped
8 ounces tofu, chopped into 1/2 inch pieces *
1 tablespoon Korean red pepper paste (go chu jang)
6 cups water or vegetable stock
1 tablespoon rice vinegar
1 tablespoon soy sauce
1/2 cup short grain white rice
Couple handfuls of spinach
Black pepper

**

Procedure

1. Pour 2 tablespoons of the sesame oil into a pot over medium-high heat. Toss in the scallions and cook for about a minute. Then dump in the kimchi, tofu, and red pepper paste. Stir and cook for 30 seconds or so.

2. Pour in the water or stock, vinegar, and soy sauce. Bring to a boil and then reduce to a simmer. Add the rice, stir, and cook for about 15 to 20 minutes, or until the rice is tender. With about 10 minutes in, add the spinach. At the last second, add the last tablespoon of sesame oil and a few cracks of freshly ground black pepper.

*The recipe doesn't specify, but I would use firm to extra-firm tofu otherwise it breaks up into little pieces. . . like mine did. It was still good though.

** You can also add a teaspoon or two of flax seed meal. I add this to almost everything I cook to get my omega threes. You can't even tell it's there.


6 comments:

Joni said...

Sounds very yum city to me too!!

Audie said...

What is kimchi?

Boom said...

I would use brown rice. It would taste just as good and brown rice has much more nutritional value than white rice does.

Love, Mom

Necha said...

Yum, I want to try it...but I'm with Audie, what is Kimchi??

Boom said...

Google Kimchi. It can be a lot more than fermented cabbage. I want to try to make a more extensive variety.

Mary Ann Carlile said...

Leslie, I can't believe you made Kimchi and didn't send your family running out of the house! No, seriously, my best friend from USU went to Korea on her mission and she tried and tried to get me to like it...I just couldn't get past the smell! I could even tell she had eaten it and then I would pick her up in my car and my car would just reek of it! Love me some kimchi...;)