All posts tagged: Korean food

bone soup

Oxtail Soup: Natural Healing and Immune Booster for Winter

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The second half of 2018 has flown by while I was lost in the vine and exam. What a remarkable year it has been, with many new opportunities and challenges thrown at me… all at once… I’ve muddled through somehow, despite some physical and mental hurts. Now that all wines are resting after pressing, it’s time for me to heal my burnt-out self with this soulful soup and prepare for the next rounds. You might think I’m being overly dramatic but surely, being responsible for an entire harvest for the first time is a full emotional ride. However, it has been such an enriching experience and I’m so glad that I was given the chance, even though, as they say, precious things come with a price. The price of not being able to share everyday moments with my family was one, but the bigger price was not being able to write for my blog or study for my WSET exam. I really missed the joy of writing and of course, cooking. December is a festive month …

wine

Korean New Year Feast and Chamlija Wine Tasting

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I’m back home after finishing the three-day Korean New Year Feast event and spending extra days catching up on personal affairs in Istanbul. The event was great, especially the part of meeting new amazing people, which is why I love what I do. Here I’ll share the atmosphere and delicious foods we ate and the special wines we drank for those who couldn’t join us. As promised, I presented 4 good wines from Chamlija (Papaskarasi is missing in the photo). Many thanks to Ozkan Uner from A2A Photography for excellent photos. He’s a very talented and respected photographer and, though his expertise is in aviation photography, he takes great food photos as well. By sheer coincidence, two chefs were in matching red to celebrate the year of Rooster. Really, I didn’t think of it when I decided to put on my red skirt. Anyway, since it’s a special day, for one of the starters, I offered a royal dish, which goes by the name of ‘Gujeolpan – Nine Delicacies‘. We started with the colourfully arranged little delicacies with seasonal vegetables and home-smoked trout and …

radish miso tahini

KIMCHI Workshop and Radish Spinach Miso Tahini Rice Bowl

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It was fun making kimchi with many people and I was proud to share my know-hows and clarify some of the myths surrounding the most essential Korean food. I was also very surprised by the enthusiasm of the participants, who seemed more obsessed with kimchi than me!

I would like to thank those who joined the event and also, Istanbul Cooking School for opening their space for us.

korean wedding

Korean Traditional Wedding and Tastes of Seoul Streets

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Sorry, the second part of the Korean trip was delayed. The 2 weeks of the Turks’ adventure can’t be summed up in one post, right? So here’s the more interesting one. Our Turkish guests were lucky to attend two weddings during their stay as my brother’s modern wedding came only two days after my traditional Korean wedding. Two completely different styles in two far distanced cities. The traditional Korean wedding, though more complex and less glamorous(?), was fun and even educational for the guests, the old and the young together. It was most likely their first and last time to experience it. Having done it myself, I can understand why it had gone out of favour. However, with the rise of international marriage, the tradition is said to be coming back and it was indeed a very memorable experience, and the best part of it is unarguably trying on the beautiful traditional clothes, Hanbok. Three tough Turks flew all the way to Korea to carry my bridal carriage and to throw wild chickens into the air for blessing. Have you cuddled a live chicken …

Turks go to Korea: Cultural and Culinary Shock, Pleasure, and a TurKo Tie

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I’m back from a long and exhausting trip. The 2 weeks of our time in Korea were divided into two; a road trip and a family affair, which I’ll write about in the next post. But first, I’ll share stories from our trip out of Seoul. For those who are not familiar with Asian culture and who visit Korea for the first time, there are two challenges; first, chopsticks, and second, sleeping on the floor. The first wasn’t a big issue since most restaurants had forks available, and as time went by, the Turkish guests got better and better with chopsticks and even got to love them and bought some to use in Turkey, with some thinking that they will probably lose weight by eating chopsticks, hahah. But everyone refusing to sleep on the floor often complicated things when booking an accommodation. Most Koreans sleep on beds nowadays but there are people who still prefer to sleep on a warm floor like my mum, and many hotels have options for a room with a bed or under-floor heating. The fact is that you …

korean food

Flavours of Korea and Far East @Revolte Cafe Pub

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Another Korean food event took place last Saturday. This time it was a little different to the previous as I, self-taught and instinctive cook, was joined by a professionally trained chef, Seçkin @5KitchenModa. While working together in the kitchen, I was reminded of ‘The Cook and the Chef‘, the Australian TV show, though I’m not as old as Maggie! I’m hoping to mature like her though. A lot of people showed interest in the event again and the tables got quickly booked out. This time it was for finger foods rather than a full course meal, which is usually more labour intensive. Imagine rolling out 100 dumpling wrappers and rolling 100 spring rolls! What makes it even more difficult is the lack of access to basic ingredients. I could have easily bought the tofu and bean sprouts but I made both from scratch because I don’t like the taste of tofu sold here. And Seckin even smoked the fish for the sushi because we didn’t want to use imported farmed salmon. When I was introduced to him, I sensed that we …