Hot and slightly spicy Korean Kimchi and Tofu Jjigae (soup)

Hot and slightly spicy Korean Kimchi and Tofu Jjigae (soup)

Hot and slightly spicy Korean Kimchi and Tofu Jjigae (soup)

Soup Name:

Korean  Kimchi and Tofu Jjigae (Soup)

Nature:  Cool (although could be warmer depending on how spicy you make it, but this is driven by the cooling white radish and tofu)

Taste:  Sweet, Salty

For more videos, you can follow us on YouTube.

I know there’s a thought that this is a fusion (and not completely authentically Korean) of Chinese and Western elements, and you’re right! 

The Korean soup dashi base though, I can assure you is completely authentic!  You can find the full post and video available for you to start this amazing soup.

The great thing about this soup base is that you can make so many soups with this base!  And today, I really wanted a kimchi and tofu soup (usually served with rice!). 

Once you have the soup base, you can craft or create the soup you want.  I’ve gone with a simple combination that is less spicy and a bit untraditional in that it’s more like a Chinese fusion version with the Korean dashi soup base.

Some key ingredients in Korean spicy stews is the pepper flakes.  This is what makes it bright red and spicy!  

What’s involved?

Prep time: 5 mins (with 40 mins from dashi prep)

Cook time: 10 mins

Total time: 15 mins

Serves: 1 L individual pot of stew (or soup)

Ingredients

Optional:

  • 20 g of Korean pepper flakes (gochugaru)
  • 1 tsp of toasted sesame oil
  • 1 raw egg

 

Cooking Instructions

To make the Korean dashi (soup base), you can follow these instructions below (and also following this post):

 

  1. Remove the heads from your dried anchovies and put them into your soup pot.  No washing or cleaning is needed, just simply remove from the bag.
  2. Remove the dried seaweed sheet from the packaging and snap into pieces to fit into the pot and put into the pot
  3. Peel your white radish (enough to remove all the skin if you plan to eat it, as the skin can be quite tough and unpleasant to eat) and slice into 1 cm thick slices (or any thickness you’d like)
  4. Put everything into your soup pot
  5. Add in the water
  6. Boil on high for 10 minutes, covered
  7. Reduce boil to another 20 minutes
  8. Strain all the ingredients, separating the liquid from the soup goodies 
  9. This strained soup is your dashi!  You can use directly as is into your soup of choice or put into mason jars and store in the fridge for up to 3 days.

To make the rest of the kimchi tofu soup:

 

  1. In a separate individual pot, scoop the Korean dashi soup to start this dish.  For mine, I’m using ox tail and fresh white radish, so I’ve scooped healthy amounts as part of my meal.  Scoop in ONLY HALF the volume of the pot as you’ll want to save space for the additional ingredients
  2. Turn that on to a medium boil
  3. Add in the fresh kimchi, soft tofu (in the middle), fresh cabbage and any meats
  4. Cover and let that boil for 10 minutes to allow all the ingredients to soften together
  5. Once soft, you can garnish with green onions
  6. Serve while still bubbling and enjoy!

EQUIPMENT USED

To answer your questions on what equipment I'm using, I've built a section here where you can find and explore what I'm using to make soups.  Ingredients are a little harder, but I will do my best as I source them around.  However, you can always message me on Instagram, TikTok, YouTube, or Facebook, and I will reply and try to point you in some direction!  

A great help for fish or small bones in soups, including small ingredients such as barley, fox nuts, spices just to keep everything together.

A MUST HAVE in the kitchen!  Energy saving, cost effective, and perfect for busy chefs!  Check out my article here that explains it.

Another MUST HAVE in the kitchen for soups!  It's so fine that it will scoop off the top oil and foam layer when using meats in your soup!

I use these types of stove top safe tea pots to make most of my herbal teas!

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Heat Clearing Sugarcane and Water Chestnuts and Imperatae Root Herbal Tea

Heat Clearing Sugarcane and Water Chestnuts and Imperatae Root Herbal Tea

Heat Clearing Sugarcane and Water Chestnuts and Imperatae Root Herbal Tea

Soup Name:

Heat clearing sugarcane and water chestnuts and imperatae root herbal tea

Traditional Chinese Name:

竹蔗茅根馬蹄湯 (zhú zhè máogēn mǎtí tāng)

 

For videos, visit us on YouTube. 

A traditional Chinese drink which helps cool the body, reduce heatiness, and clear phlegm and unwanted body fluids. It’s natural sweetness is perfect for hot summer days and this can be drank cold or hot. It is commonly found as a drink in most herbal dessert shops and is even bottled commercially.

The key to this heat clearing tea is the water chestnuts.  I don’t use them often as this version also uses corn, carrots, or corn silk, but I’ve kept it simple for heat clearing only.  The water chestnuts are a very cooling ingredient and combined with the imperatae (or mao gen) root, is extra potent to clear excess yang.  

What’s involved?

Prep time: 10 mins

Cook time: 30 minutes

Total time: 40 mins

Serves: 6 bowls

Ingredients

 

Cooking Instructions

  1. Prepare your sugar cane by chopping into smaller 2-inch length pieces
  2. Rinse, peel and rinse the water chestnuts.  You can cut into bite-sized edible pieces if you also like eating them.  
  3. Add to cold water into your soup pot
  4. Boil on medium heat covered for 30 minutes
  5. 5 minutes before serving, drop in your rock sugar.
  6. Serve and enjoy!

Any benefits?

  • This is a great tea for BBQ’ing or hotpot as it’s cooling and removes heat from the body, especially the stomach
  • It can served as a tea or soup
  • It is vegetarian, so perfect for any soup or tea drinker
  • This can be drank cold or hot (you’ll often find this as a heated drink served in the streets of Hong Kong)
  • You can make a big pot and store in the fridge for one week.  Just be sure to let it sit to room temperature or heat up before consumption
  • You can have a few variations of this soup or tea depending on ingredients at home (such as adding sugared dried winter melon, water chestnuts, or simply using sugar cane and imperatae)

For videos, visit us on YouTube. 

Fresh water chestnuts are crispy, firm, and high in water content.  They don’t have the best storage life, so keep them in the fridge as much as you can.  As the water chestnuts “age”, they’ll breakdown and become starchy, have a crumbly texture, and lose it’s moisture content.  Which in turn, makes your soup or tea cloudy, which is still OK, as long as the water chestnuts still hold some of their firmness. 

For other variations of this tea:

Sugar Cane and Imperatae Drink

 

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