United Colors of Benetton.

Cooking Korean food is the culinary equivalent of Chinese water torture. Traditional Korean dishes require a lot of drying, reconstituting, squeezing-dry, pickling, fermenting, mixing, simmering and stirring - all demanding the utmost patience and attention. The result is a cuisine that is a complex of flavors and textures that is all at once, heartwarming and enticing, but also, a real pain in the ass.

That being said, I invited my favorite group of future attorneys to my place for a potluck night, asking all the guests to bring something representative of their own (or favorite) culture. Naturally, this meant that I would have to torture myself (see above), but I decided to keep it relatively simple, and make dduk-bok-ee and kimchi jun.

Dduk-bok-ee

Typically, dduk-bok-ee consists of long pieces of rice cakes with onions, fish cake and sometimes ramen noodles in a thick, spicy red pepper paste sauce. Unsure of my guests' tolerance for spiciness and fish cake, I opted for the non-spicy, soy sauce-based, beef-instead-of-fish-cake kind: "goong-joong" (royal) dduk-bok-ee. Only the best for my friends.

Kimchi jun

I prefer kimchi when it's cooked, whether it's being grilled on the side of the barbecue grill or boiled in kimchi chigae; any of which requires the kimchi to be sufficiently fermented. The smell of "sufficiently fermented" kimchi is... well, there's no real comparison - it's pretty potent. But mixed with some Korean "pancake mix" and water, and then pan fried, it's delicious - the Korean equivalent of latkes. Crispy on the outside, but hot and chewy on the inside.

Our international potluck was a success. There were dolmas, honey walnut shrimp, KFC, Beard Papa's cream puffs, a cherry-custard tart, cookies, ice cream and sangria. Lots of sangria. Everyone loved the food and more importantly, had a fun night. But for now, I return the torch to the masters: my mom, my aunts and the ladies at my go-to restaurant in LA's Koreatown for some home cooking away from home. (See: http://www.yelp.com/biz/mapo-kkak-doo-gee-restaurant-los-angeles)

Like pudding.

Gye-ran jjim

Translation: steamed eggs

There is an art to making gye-ran jjim. The ratio of eggs to water. The temperature at which you steam it. The bain-marie used to cook the eggs to the right consistency. The patience and the will power to not open the lid to check.

So did I figure out all of this on my own? Of course not. This all started with a recipe published in The Korea Times (English version). Do I read The Korea Times regularly? Of course not. I am the Queen of web browsing, and while researching on my health care law paper topic, I ended up in The Korea Times. (Food for thought: Apparently, South Korea is banking on the highly-anticipated boom of the medical tourism industry.)

Gye-ran jjim is comfort food, Korean-style. The truth is: I'm not a big fan. The way I feel about gye-ran jjim is the way I feel about chocolate. I don't care for it, but I'll eat it. For my dad, however, gye-ran jjim is laced with nostalgia for his childhood in Korea, along with sausages (the Korean kind - processed with more fillers, like flour, than meat), Samyang Ramen and Hershey's chocolate. It's all very post-Korean-War/GIs-handing-out-American-candies sort of thing.

Anyways, I made it. The ingredients are simple: eggs, water and salt. I just wanted to achieve the right consistency - more pudding/custard-like than just overcooked/ coddled eggs. The result? "Tastes just like pudding," said my dad.

Moules frites.

I have never been to Paris.
I have never been to Europe, for that matter.
But I love Paris.
I love films made in French and films set in France.
I love Edith Piaf.
I love the mini Eiffel Tower on my desk.
Paris, je t'aime.

So what better way to transport me to Paris than to make French food? Le menu du jour: Moules frites.
With the help of Michael Chiarello, I steamed mussels in a white wine broth of garlic, shallots, fennel and of course, le beurre.


Now, you might have been expecting me to say that I hand-cut potatoes to fry up some homemade French fries. I appreciate gourmet cuisine, but I'm not that crazy. 4 words: Trader Joe's Garlic Fries. So good. And baked, not fried. :)

Bon appétit!

But I forgot one thing: la bière. Fail.