Simple Japchae

Japchae is Korean stir fry starch noodle with vegetable, seasoned with sesame oil and soy sauce. Usually it will have spinach, carrot, and mushroom as well, but today I'm making a very simple one. The japchae I cooked today only using onion, green onion and beef with the noodle, it's a lot more simple and easy to make compare to the original version. This japchae remind me of the Korean TV series, City Hunter, where the main character only eat japchae with beef and no vegetable at all.
The preparation of this noodle is rather unique, instead of frying all the ingredients together, we boil the noodle, then stir fry all the component separately.
This recipe was adapted from Maangchi's japchae recipe. She's the master of Korean food!

Ingredients,

1 lb (450gr) Korean starch noodle

1 big onion, slice thinly

7 green onion, slice crosswise

1 pack rib eye (around 0.8 lb) or sliced beef

1 handful of garlic, crush and chop finely

roasted sesame seed (optional)

3 pinch of sugar

soy sauce

sesame oil

olive oil

Cooking Method,

1. Boil water in a pot, then put the noodle and cook around 3 minutes or until it cooked.

2. Drain the noodle, then put the noodle into a big bowl and cut them with scissor.

3. Add 2 tbs of sesame oil and 5 tbs of light soy sauce.

4. Heat some olive oil on a pan, stir fry the onion until wilted and turn transparent, then put it on the big bowl with the noodle.

5. Heat some olive oil on the pan, stir fry the green onion for one minute, then add them to the big bowl.

6.Heat more olive oil on the pan, add the garlic, stir until fragrant

7. Add the beef, 3 tbs soy sauce and 2 pinch of sugar. Stir until the beef cooked, then transfer them into the big bowl.

8. Add some roasted sesame seeds if you like

9. Add another 2 tbs of sesame oil and soy sauce to season, mix them well. Somehow, whenever I season this type of noodle, I always end up using large amount of soy sauce...and no, they don't taste salty! :)

10. This dish best serve with kimchi <3

Korean Chicken & Eggplant Salad

At my Church, after the service ended, we always have lunch together. We have 2 different cooking team that take turn to cook for everyone, and sometimes it's potluck too. One day, my friend Hiromi made this light and delicious chicken and eggplant salad, and this dish is inspired by her delicious dish.
She wrote me a recipe with the precise measurement, but I don't really use measurement for my salad, I keep tasting and season, tasting and season my food, until I satisfied with the taste. This dish is very easy, healthy and  delicious <3

Ingredients,
1/2 pack of boneless skinless chicken tight. Trim the fat.
2 big eggplants, halves then and cut into 4.

Sauce Ingredients,
Aji-Mirin / sweet cooking rice wine
Korean red pepper powder
light soy sauce
sesame oil
roasted sesame seeds
black pepper & sugar
4 garlic, chopped.
5 green onion, chopped medium length

Cooking Method, 
1. Boil the chicken meat, then chopped into smaller pieces. set aside.
2. Steam the eggplants, then set aside.
3. Mix the sauce ingredients in a large bowl. I like mine taste tangy / sour, so pretty much my comparison for the mirin : soy sauce : sesame oil = 2 : 2 : 1. You can adjust the sauce to your own personal taste.
4. Add the Korean redd pepper powder, roasted sesame seeds, chopped garlic, then dash some black pepper and sugar.
5. Taste Taste Taste!
6. When you already satisfied with the sauce, toss in the chicken, eggplants and green onion. Mix them well.
7. it's ready to eat.