Farming and KimchiAnd Mr. Park does it again! Every time I hang out w/ this 69 year old man, I end up having a really enjoyable and culturally rich time.
In the picture on the left, starting from the left there is Mr. Park, Mrs. Kumi (Korean women traditionally do NOT take their husbands name), Me and my friend Amy. Behind us is a pile of just about 100 Korean cabbages, a.k.a. Napa cabbage. Regardless of what you call them, I cannot deny the fact that picking them and then wheeling them the approximately 500m to Mr. Park's house was sweat inducing work. But let me start from the beginning.
I have been enjoying copious amounts of chigae, and as you know from the recipe I included a couple posts ago, Kimchi is the key ingredient. In fact, the better quality Kimchi you use the more tasty chiagae you can make. So, in my never ending attempt to learn how to cook various different world cuisines, and just recently realizing that the Kimchi back in the states is not nearly as tasty as the stuff we have here, I figured I need to learn how to make the stuff. And that's where this all started.
Earlier this week Mr. Park told me that he and his wife had begun to make their annual batch of Kimchi. Keep in mind, their annual batch includes enough for them to sell to some distributors and to stock their shelves. This roughly translates to about 2000 cabbages. Again, the pile you can see in the picture above is just about 100 cabbages, so we're talking about a TON of Kimchi. In any case, as making Kimchi is something only married women (and older married women) typically know about, I was very excited to hear about Mr. Park's wife making her annual batch because none of my younger co-workers know the process. In any case, I asked Mr. Park if I could come watch his wife in action, and he was thrilled at my interest.
Yesterday afternoon we left Samnam, header over to Pangi Elementary to pick up Amy, and headed to Mr. Parks house. Mrs. Kumi greeted us and gave us a snack of sweet potatoes (also grown on their farm) as well as some sort of peanut tea. Mr. Park then showed us the approximately 4 trashcan sized bins FILLED w/ cabbage that would soon be turned into Kimchi. And keep in mind, these four bins will be filled dozens more times as they process a few tons of cabbage into Kimchi...all by hand.
In any case, I was excited to learn the Kimchi making process when Mr. Park suddenly asked Amy if we were ready to go pick some cabbage. Not wanting to be rude, we both obliged him and after gearing up w/ work gloves, as well as a couple borrowed coats and hats, we headed towards the cabbage field. Mr. Park lead the way since he had a big wheel barrow type device for transporting the cabbage and since he also knew the way. Seemingly effortlessly, Mr. Park dragged the wheel barrow at a very brisk pace and we finally arrived at the patch.
In less than 20 seconds, Mr. Park had begun slicing the cabbages right at their tap-root. Amy and I assumed we were supposed to fill the wheel barrow, so we did just that. A few minutes later we had filled the wheel barrow to capacity (about 20 cabbages) and then Mr. Park instructed Amy to "stay there" while he walked with me back to his home. This time, Mr. Park briskly pulled the filled wheel barrow.
We dumped the load near his front steps, and this time I got to drag the empty wheel barrow back to the field. I'm a bit embarrassed to say this, but I don't think I was able to pull it as fast as the 69 year old man. Regardless, we arrived back to the field and now it was completely dark.
Amy and I then continued to fill the wheel barrow and tote it back and forth until we had picked (and wheeled back to Mr. Park's home) about 100 cabbages.
Then, quite sweaty and surprisingly tired (we only worked for about 30 minutes) we washed our hands, headed inside, and enjoyed a super delicious dinner of dumpling soup and side dishes. To Amy's credit: She's a vegetarian and they served us meat dumplings. In the most subtle and thus polite way possible, Amy at everything except for the meat. She even at the dumpling rapper, and she didn't mention anything otherwise. (And to quickly rant about vegetarians, one of which I used to be...to be quite frank, sometimes they get preachy and expect everyone to cater to their needs. Amy's not like that at all. She rolls w/ the punches and makes the best of what ever meat is thrown her way. Mad respect.)
Finally after play farmer and eating dinner, we got to learning how to make Kimchi. It went something like this.
Mrs. Kumi dragged out two large round tubs. One was filled w/ cabbage and one was filled w/ the Kimchi chilli paste. She also got out a square container which we would use to store the finished product. In the middle of their living room Ms. Kumi, Amy and I put on rubber gloves and aprons and began the process of spreading the chili paste on the cabbage and then packing the cabbage into the square storage container. We worked for about 30 minutes and then were done.
Here's the whole process (only the last part of which we experienced)
How to Make Kimchi:
1. Take a Korean/Napa cabbage, remove and dispose of the outer leaves until you are only left w/ the whiter inner "heart" of the cabbage.
2. Cut the cabbage heart into quarters the long way.
3. Create a bucket of salt water. (I don't know how much salt to use in the mixture, but do it to taste...it shouldn't be CRAZY salty, but it also should not be too weak).
4. Dip the quartered cabbages into the salt water. Shake off the excess water and then put the "brined" cabbage into a storage container.
5. Sprinkle additional salt onto the brined cabbage.
6. Repeat steps 4 and 5 until you have used all the cabbage.
7. Let the brined/salted cabbage sit for 24-48 hours (the cabbage should look pretty wilted when it is ready. ) Make sure the cabbage is sitting in such a way that the water which is drawn out can drain off or at least not touch the cabbage. Ideally, put the cabbage into some sort of strainer and put the strainer over a bucket
8. Take the cabbage and rinse off the excess salt.
9. Rub the chili paste(yang-yome-jang)* all over the cabbage and pack the cabbage into an airtight container.
10. Let the cabbage sit in the refrigerator until it ferments to taste, or if you are in a hurry to get it fermenting, leave it out on the kitchen counter for 3-5 days (again, really judge when it is done by taste...the longer you leave it out, the tangier it'll get.)
11. Voila, you have Kimchi...this stuff can be eaten (provided it's been refrigerated) for up to a year after it's been put in the container. (In fact, I have some year old Kimchi that Mrs. Kumi gave me, and it's DELICIOUS!)
*Here's how to make the chili paste...and since Mrs. Kumi didn't give me an exact recipe, I'll approximate it here. The finished product is a semi-viscous dark red paste/soup. She said that all she uses is garlic paste and Korean chilli paste. The mixture was thin enough to spread all over the cabbage, but it was not drippy or runny. It was able to amply coat the cabbage. It was also just mildly spicy. In fact, it was not that spicy at all. If I were to make my own, I might try to use a stronger pepper. Regardless, it seemed like the mixture was about 1:1 chilli pepper paste to garlic paste w/ maybe a little extra water thrown in. I could imagine a Cuisinart would be perfect for making the paste.
Okay...That's all for now. To recap, Amy and I got WAY more than we bargained for, but I' super happy we got to experience this part of Korean culture. Everyone here gobbles up TONS of this stuff, and now, I have the secret to make it!
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