Any Korean mamas?

[cristeen]

I love Korean food, and would love to make it at home, but i need help identifying my favorite parts - the sides! They're never identified at the restaurant, and its just not the same without a few sides.

I picked up take out today, and these were the sides:
Kim chee is obvious.
Theres a salad of bean sprouts
Another salad that i think is julienned daikon, a little sweet, sometimes pink.
Seaweed salad
A zucchini salad (or squash of some kind, cut in rounds)
A veg salad made of an unidentifiable veg cut in chunks, a nice al dente texture
Strips of omellet
Strips of something beige and chewy, almost like gluten-y
Battered/fried zucchini
What looks like translucent glassy noodles

If anyone can even put names to some of these, i'd appreciate it, but a good resource for recipes (book or website), or even your fave recipe would be great! I can find virtually any ingredient i might need w a walk into Chinatown.

[nomadmom]

sub'ing

Edited by nomadmom - 7/9/11 at 1:24pm

[staceychev]

Is the beige gluten-y stuff fish cake? DD is obsessed with that. I love the fermented black beans.

Google banchan or panchan recipes.

[cristeen]

It definitely tasted fishy!  Thank you!  One down.

[Momo123]

Not Korean (married to one)... The salad of bean sprouts and round zucchini might be namul, which is basically seasoned vegetables. Many things can be made into namul (broccolli florets, bean sprouts, carrots etc.) and involved parboiling then seasoning with sesame oil, garlic, etc.

Here are two blogs with recipes, one of them has pictures so that may help!

http://www.maangchi.com/recipes/sidedishes

http://www.hannaone.com/Recipe/bcsukjunamul.html

[nomadmom]

Momo123, thank you for the links!  Dd and I have just printed several recipes off the maanchi site, and will be trying them this weekend.  And thanks, Cristeen, for letting me butt into your thread.

[cristeen]

Excellent!  THank you!!  I look forward to sitting down tonight and seeing what I can find.  I sense Korean on next week's meal plan!  :)

[missreeka]

a good cookbook for korean cooking is "cooking the korean way." i think there's a second printing out, which i haven't seen, but the first edition is really great. the recipes are simple, delicious, and there's a lot of variety. 

[Otto]

Originally Posted by missreeka 

a good cookbook for korean cooking is "cooking the korean way." i think there's a second printing out, which i haven't seen, but the first edition is really great. the recipes are simple, delicious, and there's a lot of variety. 

Growing Up in a Korean Kitchen struck me as a fairly informative read, although lack of ready availability of certain ingredients has limited my actual use of it. Saveur 46 also has nine recipes, if OP knows any magazine hoarders. The translucent noodles mentioned are probably dangmyeon, from yam starch.

[emilysmama]

Originally Posted by cristeen 

What looks like translucent glassy noodles
 

Not Korean either, but I love to eat at Korean restaurants!

I think the noodles might be the kind of noodles that you find in the noodle dish called chap chae.

I believe that they are noodles made with mung bean flour.  When they are that thin, I guess they are called vermicelli.  I know that in Chinatown, you can buy a similar type of noodle that comes in a pink mesh bag that is sometimes made in China and some times made in Taiwan.  I've been told to always buy the ones made in Taiwan because the ones made in China get mushy texture.

I assume you can buy Korean type noodle too.

Edited to add:  I googled "chap chae recipe"  It seems that they are sometimes called "glass noodle" "cellophane noodle" and can be made either from the flour of mung bean or sweet potato.  Here is what the noodle looks like, it that what you mean?