Blog Post #1 [Gimbap]

 

Gimbap is one of the most important dishes to me, my family and the Korean culture. In fact, I believe gimbap is one of the most common food for many Korean people. It is often the case where Korean families either get or make gimbap to eat all together. It is also common for Korean students or even adults to bring gimbap with them to school or workplaces to eat as their meal. I believe gimbap to Korean people is very much like a sandwich to American people. Gimbap is one of the best-known Korean food that many people can enjoy as light but a full one-time meal. It is also culturally very significant in that many enjoy not only eating but also making gimbap altogether. Gimbap, in terms of meaning, can be directly translated as seaweed-rice. The translation makes sense in that it is rice with other ingredients wrapped in seaweed. There are a hundred different kinds of gimbap depending on the person who makes it. Although there are guidelines regarding how to make and what to put in gimbap, many Korean people choose to vary what they get as their gimbap ingredients. For example, the most commonly known gimbap includes tuna gimbap, bulgogi gimbap, veggie-gimbap, and sausage gimbap.

 

Regarding the history of gimbap, the basic idea of eating rice with other ingredients originally came from Japanese-sushi. The exact date and location of where Korean gimbap was first made are unknown. Yet, it is said that since the Josun dynasty, seaweed aquaculture was well-known throughout all parts of Korea. Among all regions, Gyangyang, located in the Southern part of the Korean peninsula, paid special attention to seaweed cultivation. People in Gyangyang believed that eating rice with seaweed could better their eye sights and thus had the tradition of eating seaweed with rice during Korean Thanksgiving. Considering the fact that seaweed is rich in vitamin A, Korean ancestor’s belief is indeed based on fact and is reliable. Although there are no exact evidence, it is thought that such belief brought people to develop the idea of eating rice with seaweed and eventually came up with gimbap.

 

Gimbap, to me and my family, is, I believe, more significant compared to any other people. My father always picks gimbap as his favorite food and thus since I was very young, our family would often gather around on weekends to make gimbap altogether. As mentioned before, gimbap is rice and other ingredients wrapped in a big sheet of seaweed. Although, it may look simple, each and single one of the ingredients that go inside require a significant amount of workload. In regard to our family, my father was in charge of putting and spreading rice evenly across the piece of seaweed. My younger brother and I were in charge of putting different ingredient on the rice. The ingredients that go inside always varied depending on what we wanted to eat each day. Fried carrot, spinach, cucumber, and egg garnish always went in as defaults. Yet, we would always argue whether to put bulgogi or cooked beef seasoned with salt. It was almost always the cooked beef that went inside our gimbap as my mother just extremely hated spending another load of time making bulgogi. Then, when my brother and I did our jobs of putting the ingredients neatly on the rice, my mother was in the part that required most skill. She would roll the seaweed so that it wrapped all around the rice and other ingredients. Then, she would gently cut the rolled kimbap into about ten pieces so that we can eat them more easily later. It takes about two hours for our four members to make our way from cooking the rice and preparing the ingredients to finally wrapping seaweed, cutting them and setting them neatly on our plate. Making gimbap together indeed requires a fair amount of teamwork and adequate communication as each one of us need to know when exactly the previous step will be done and be prepared to do our part in order for us to do the work in a time efficient manner. Choosing the ingredients that go inside gimbap also requires all of us to communicate and compromise in order to finally decide our menu. The long process of making gimbap, for our family, was a once-in-a-while family event in which we all gathered around to spend time together and get something accomplished altogether.

 (Picture of my Family)

My family and I used to gather at least once every month to make gimbap together until we got older. Now that I’m living abroad away from my family, and so is my younger brother, I genuinely miss those times where we had so much fun making and then finally eating gimbab.

 (Brought from Korean Bapsang)

<Recipe of Gimbap> (4 servings)

Ingredients:

For wrapping:

• 4 sheets of dried seaweed
• 2 cups of warm cooked rice
• 2 tablespoons of sesame oil
• 3 teaspoon of salt
• 2 teaspoons of vinegar

For fillings:

• 250g of ground beef (marinated with salt and pepper)
• 1 carrot (shredded)
• 1 cucumber (cut into long strips)
• 500g of spinach (boiled and chopped)
• 4 large eggs

Methods:

1. In a medium bowl mix 2 cups of warm cooked rice with a tablespoon of sesame oil, 1 teaspoon of salt, and 2 teaspoons of vinegar.
2. Cook 250g of ground beef (already marinated with salt and pepper) for 5 minutes and place it on a bowl.
3. Stir-fry a carrot (already shredded) with 1 teaspoon of salt.
4. Mix 500g of pre- boiled spinach with 1 teaspoon of salt.
5. Whisk 4 eggs until the color turns yellow and fry it into a flat omelet. Then cut the cooked eggs into 8 long strips.
6. On a bamboo sushi roller, place a dried seaweed sheet.
7. On the dried seaweed sheet, place the rice prepared and spread it evenly across so that the rice fills ¾ of the seaweed sheet.
8. On the rice, and in a single layer, place 2 strips of cooked egg, 1 strip of cucumber, 60g of ground beef, ¼ of the prepared spinach, and ¼ of the shredded carrot.
9. Roll from the bottom pressing gently on the bamboo roll to make the fillings stay in. Roll it all the way to the end of the bamboo mat.
10. Place ¼ teaspoon of sesame oil on the top seam to keep the roll stuck together.
11. Cut the roll of gimbap into about 10 pieces.