Korean breakfasts and other questions to my mom

I asked my mom a few questions to get the ball rolling. She was kind enough to do it over email, which ensures that all the Korean is correct (my spelling is less than stellar) and also helps to roll through a bunch of questions that can otherwise lead to long (and mostly lovely) stories.

Here's what I asked her:

1.  What did you eat for breakfast in Korea?

2.  How old were you when you had your first ice cream?  Egg?  Cheese?

3.  What do you typically eat during the week?

4.  How many times a week do you eat non-Korean food?

5.  What is your favorite food memory?

6.  Do you think the American diet has affected the growth of me and Jamie?

7.  Oh, and when did you come to the US?  Was it 1972?  You and Oppa got married in 1974, right?  I think so but it's been a long time since you told me.

Because each answer deserves a blog in its own right, I am going to go through the answers one at a time starting with breakfast.

1.  What did you eat for breakfast in Korea?

밥, 국(콩나물, 무, 시금치, 된장, 두부) 김치

In case you need a translation, she says that she ate rice, soup (bean sprout, white radish, spinach, tofu), and kimchee.

Where's the part about a bacon, egg, and cheese sandwich?  Rion and I are thrilled about our new Korean diet but breakfast is so hard to give up.  "American" breakfasts are our favorite meals.  Ri makes a quiche or fritatta at the beginning of the week, usually Sundays, which we eat piece by piece every morning throughout the week.  It's quick and easy to divy and nuke for a minute while we groggily trudge through our morning routines.  Losing the quick, easy, and delicious option is a tough thing to let go of.  

Rion lamented this past weekend about losing the American breakfast to our Korean diet and the only fix I could think of was to make the most delicious soup on Sunday morning (usually reserved for our buttermilk and fresh fruit pancakes with bacon) to prove that a Korean breakfast can be tasty, quick, and prepped ahead of time for our week.  I poached two eggs in the broth to add some protein and added rice for some carbs.  The end result was a delicious, creamy, soup that definitely sated our needs.  

The poached egg took the place of butter and the soup's salty enough to be tasty that early in the morning.  

Check out my korean breakfast soup recipe.

Sench and Rion’s Korean Breakfast Soup (version1)

4 qts. water

1 tbsp. soy bean paste

1 tbsp. soy sauce

1 tbsp. anchovy powder

1/2 onion (literally cut an onion in half from top to end)

2 cups raw chopped spinach

1 handful of cremini mushrooms, sliced

eggs

rice

salt and pepper to taste

Boil together the water, soy bean paste, soy sauce, anchovy powder, and the half onion.  The onion is for the stock only and not pleasant to eat first thing in the morning for us.  Salt the soup to taste and add more soy sauce if you would like an extra umame flavor.  Cook rice ahead of time and store in the fridge with the soup after it cools.  

When you are ready for breakfast, pour out two portions of soup into a hot pot and bring it to a boil.  If you don’t have a hot pot, a smaller pot is okay.  Once the soup boils add the mushrooms and the spinach.  Crack two eggs directly into the soup and poach them for about 4 minutes or desired doneness.  

Simply ladle the soup and the eggs over rice.  I like to season the eggs before serving.  Enjoy!

Ban Chan

My mother came to the Washington, DC area from Seoul, Korea in the mid-1970's with the proverbial $50 in her pocket and a dream to be an American. She married my dad in 1974 and had my older sister Jamie in 1976 and I soon followed in 1979.  My mother, who goes by her American name Anne (she named herself after the character Anne Shirley) wanted us girls to be as American as possible.  She denied us the humiliating experience of new teachers and peers butchering our Korean names by giving us only American names, Jamie and Michelle, as well as all the American birthday parties, traditional Christmases and Thanksgiving dinners.

But we weren't the same as the other kids.  We had two refrigerators, one in the basement filled with jars of preserved pickled delicacies, a language gap between generations that widened as we got older, Korean school on Friday afternoons while our friends got to go home and play, and of course, a face that didn't match those of our classmates in Northern Virginia, where we grew up. 

Still, my mother did a great job and Jamie and I are definitely Americans.  Through and through with a love of Redskins football, ham and cheese sandwiches, and a humor based on the wit of four women on TV who lived together in Miami during their golden years.  But what have we sacrificed to get here? 

On my mother's first visit out to San Francisco, where my partner Rion (like Orion without the O) live, she said to me as I stared into a full-length mirror, "Yeah, I used to weigh that much--when I was pregnant with you."  It stung but I know what she meant.  One thing is for sure--my sister and I are a lot bigger than our parents.  Okay, not A LOT bigger but there is a difference in our sizes and statures.  In fact, there is a significant difference among most of the second generation Koreans I know and their parents.  We were all raised on milk, bread, cheese, eggs, and plenty of meat like most Americans I know.  This new diet, one that was completely unavailable to our previous generation, has changed us.  For better or worse, it has made us big, strong, and itchy.  Yeah, itchy.  I bet my eczema is related to the wheat and milk that I can't get enough of.  And I'm sure there are more people like me out there. 

So can I go back?  Can I eat the food I know I am genetically predisposed to eating?  Can I be Korean for a year?  Well, I am going to try.  For a year straight, I will attempt to eat nothing but a Korean diet.  I am allowing myself to stray into other Asian cuisines--Indian, Japanese, Thai, Vietnamese--but mostly will do my best to adhere to the Korean diet.  At the very least, to stay away from dairy and see if I feel different, if my skin clears up, and learn more about the place my mother left 35 years ago.