Bountiful Spring Soup

One of my favorite things to do is gather wild vegetables and herbs – and use them.  This time of year offers abundant wild vegetables, and what to me and so many other people looks like just another weed, to Dr. Tae Yun Kim they are very precious foods.  When I am lucky enough to get to accompany her on a wild herb picking adventure, she talks about how when she was little, those herbs saved her life.  If you follow my blog you might remember that when she grew up, she was rejected and abused and eventually abandoned just because she was a girl – and during the time of having to fend for herself she relied on those wild herbs.  Later on, when Dr. Kim was training under a Buddhist monk in the Martial Arts, he passed onto her an amazing treasure of knowledge, not just what you can eat, but how to use all manner of herbs for healing all kinds of conditions.

In the above basked you can see some herbs that are easily available in most places, such as young dandelion, shepherds purse, purslane and more.  This particular basket includes a few green onions that had gone astray and grown way outside the actual vegetable garden.

In addition to the great taste, wild herbs also help detox your body after winter.

To use them in soup, soak these herbs well in apple cider vinegar for about 10 minutes, change the water, and repeat.  Then chop them up into big pieces, including the roots if you can, and boil until barely tender.

For the soup base, you really can you use any broth you like.  Chicken soup is a great one as is beef.  The most traditional way to eat the herbs is boil them briefly in “bean paste soup” or Deng Jang chigae as it is called in Korean.

Let’s go outside and gather some herbs!  Just be sure you know which ones are edible.

 

 

 

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Healthy Korean Style Stew

The title purposely says “Korean Style”, because with Dr. Tae Yun Kim there is no restriction or limit on her creativity.  She bases many of her innovative dishes and creations on the Korean cuisine of the time she was growing up, when all food was by default organic, grown on healthy soil with no chemicals applied to either ground, plants or animals.

Nowadays she shops for organically grown fruit and produce and grows a lot of her own fruits and vegetables.  She makes sure any poultry and meat she purchases came from healthy, happy, organically raised animals.

She still cleanses the meat before using it by using this method (from a few blog posts back.)

In these pictures, Dr. Tae Yun Kim started with chicken pieces, and sautéed them in some water seasoned with salt and garlic.  She added tofu and vegetables, starting with the hard varieties like carrots, onions, Brussels Sprouts and Yucca root, and then follows with mushrooms, zucchini and cabbage.

As sauce, she added her very own brand of hot sauce.  I know, not fair!  To make a close approximation of that sauce, you take a couple of spoons of gochu jang, available in any Korean store.  For us gluten-free folks – there are gluten free varieties available online and they are every bit as good.

To this you add a spoon of garlic, a couple spoons of raw sugar, and some apple cider vinegar and lemon juice.  Heat up, stir vigorously and add a few spoons to the stew, enough to cover the meat and veggies but not so much it turns soupy.  Taste and adjust seasonings.  You can add some chopped up jalapeno’s of you love it really hot.

Lastly, add some cilantro, green onions, and parsley, according to your own taste.

This stew can be served over brown rice or acorn noodles, or use chap chae noodles.  Either way, it is amazingly delicious!

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Jung SuWon warrior cry – I want chicken for dinner!

I love a simple, roasted, moist chicken.  The only thing is, who has the time to “babysit” a chicken while it’s in the oven?  Especially for dinner, when you are off at Jung SuWon training, working up an appetite.  And, what do you do to prevent this chicken from drying out? 

I asked Grandmaster Tae Yun Kim about this and here is her “secret.”  First, you put the chicken in a roasting pan.  Then, you cut up some very cold butter into 1/4 inch thick slices (works best actually if you cut the butter in slices, then freeze it, then use it).  Have some crushed garlic on hand, as well as some fresh sprigs of rosemary, salt and pepper.  With your hands, gently lift the skin away from the breast of the chicken, and put in the slices of butter, crushed garlic that you have mixed with salt and pepper, and some of the rosemary.  So in effect, you are putting all this UNDER the skin.  In addition, put a little of the salt, pepper and garlic paste on the outside of the chicken.  Pour some good white wine into the pan, about 2 inches high, add a couple handful mushrooms. Put some rosemary into the chicken cavity, along with some garlic.  Now cover it all up very tightly either with a lid or with aluminum foil, put in preheated oven, 350 degrees.  Since I usually get a couple large sized chickens for this, it takes about 2 hours to cook them. 

So you got plenty of time to come home after class, take off the lid or foil, and let the chicken brown and crispy, which will take about 15 – minutes.  You will enjoy a wonderfully moist and delicious chicken!  The butter, and the steam created through the wine, will ensure that the chicken doesn’t dry out. 

If you have a timer, you can set it before you leave, just in case you end up in a class where we sparr longer than we expect…….

To make it really easy on yourself, start the rice cooker before you go, and voila!  When you come home you got a nice dinner ready – add a salad and you’ll be all set. 

PS: should you have an leftovers – which is doubtful – they are most excellent in a chicken salad the next day!  Or add the leftover to the pasta salad in the recipe I posted earlier.

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