How to Cook Korean Bibimbap
Korean bibimbap is one of the more common things you’ll find in a Korean restaurant’s menu. It means “mixed vegetables in rice”. Turns out, it’s pretty easy to make, and the recipe is easy to adjust according to your tastes and needs. Without the ground meat, it also makes for a great vegetarian meal. Most Koreans actually make this out of leftovers. Here’s how to cook Korean bibimbap. This will serve one to two persons.
Ingredients
2 cups medium grain Korean or Japanese rice
4 shiitake mushrooms, rehydrated (if not fresh) and sliced
1 1/2 cups of freshly boiled beansprouts, strained
1 1/2 cups spinach, parboiled and strained
1 large cucumber, sliced into thin strips
2 carrots, julienned
1 zucchini, sliced into thin strips
2 tablespoons sesame oil
1 tablespoon sesame seeds, lightly toasted
1 fried egg (optional)
1/2 lb ground **** (optional)
Gochujang or red chili sauce
Procedure
Clean rice using water and drain. Put in a rice cooker and add the same amount of water as rice (in this case, two cups). Allow to cook.
Give the cucumber strips a saltwater bath. To do this, mix two tablespoon and one teaspoon of rock salt into warm water until the salt dissolves completely. Let the cucumbers soak in the brine for 20 minutes, and then drain.
Add some flavor to your bean sprouts by mixing in two teaspoons of sesame oil, one teaspoon salt and a pinch of sesame seeds.
Sauté the carrot slices, mushrooms and zucchini with a dash of salt. Sauté each ingredient separately.
Cook the ground ****.
Typically, Koreans use a special type of bowl to keep the dish extra hot that you can cook an egg in it while mixing. However, if you do not have this stone bowl, fry the egg in advance if you want an egg in your bibimbap.
Scoop rice in a bowl. Do not overfill and make sure the rice reaches only a little over half of the bowl.
Place the egg in the center of the rice, such that the egg yolk is in the exact middle.
Arrange each ingredient to their own specific location on the surface, like a pizza, only not scattered.
Serve with a side of gochujang or red chili sauce that is common in most Korean groceries. The closest you can get to this is red chili sauce.
Mix it all up, add the spicy red sauce as desired, and enjoy your Korean bibimbap.