My local grocery store doesn't sell kimchi, but they have a great Asian sauce selection and a surprisingly well stocked instant noodle section. Very strange.
Since I had most of the ingredients, I decided to give kimchi a try! Found a recipe online for some Yangbaechu kimchi on koreanbapsang.com so let's go:
You'll need:
- 1 head of green cabbage
- 3-4 green onions
- 2 carrots
- 3 tbsp table salt
- 4 tbsp gochugaru (red pepper powder)
- 3 tbsp fish sauce
- 1 tbsp sugar
- 1 tbsp minced garlic
- 1/2 tsp grated ginger
Instructions:
- Remove the outer leaves and chop the cabbage into bite sized (~1-2 inch) pieces
- Rinse thoroughly and drain, place cabbage into a large bowl
- Pour salt over the cabbage and mix well
- Leave for ~2 hours, adding a tbsp of salt and mixing every 30 minutes
- While the cabbage is softening, chop the green onions into similar sized pieces
- Prepare the carrots by peeling them and chopping into whatever size you want - I went for a mixture of match-sticks and ~1 inch long thin slices (from my peeler)
- Mix the gochugaru, fish sauce, sugar, garlic, and ginger together with 1/2 cup water
- After 2 hours, rinse the cabbage well and return to the large bowl, add green onions and carrots
- Add the sauce on top and get those hands dirty! mix well to distribute the sauce
- Pack tightly into a storage container, I used an 8 cup Rubbermaid plastic one
- Leave the container out on the counter over night, then store in the fridge
Recipe credit goes to koreanbapsang.com.
I added some sesame seeds on top for presentation, this was right before I crammed the lid on and forced as much air out as I could.
The 8 cup size storage container seemed to be made for this recipe. A medium sized head of green cabbage, 2 medium carrots, and 4 green onions.