Homemade Korean BBQ (Bulgogi)

So, I promised Liz from Carpe Season that I would share my recipe for homemade Korean BBQ sauce.  It took me forever to get around to this (sorry!)  Since nobody follows this blog (it's really just a place for me to post and then look back at pictures from our adventures and such) this is pretty much just for you!

Meat-pig!  Our favorite.

Meat-cow works too, if it's thinly sliced.  :)

The first thing I realized when I went shopping for supplies was that the most important thing about this recipe is probably the cut of meat.  Hopefully there are enough Asian folks in your area to sustain at least one good Asian market!  If so, that's where you want to go.  We like meat-pig better than meat-cow, so we chose the pork.  However, you can also use beef.  Just make sure it's very marbled and very thinly sliced.  I've heard the cut of beef that works best for this called "flanken" steak.  Maybe a friendly butcher can help you out.  The bottom line is, it doesn't have to be expensive meat; it just needs to be thin and well marinated.

Sorry for the iciness of the packages and the iPhone quality pictures... but this isn't a food blog and I am NOT the photographer you are!

I did, however, want you to at least get a peek at what these cuts of meat look like, so you can try to find something similar if you try your hand at this sometime in the future.  I hope you do... I would love to see really nice photos of it... this isn't a terribly photogenic dish, especially if you're trying to pretend you're a photographer and food blogger while making it!

Not *too* many things... 

So... here is the ingredient list:

Sauce:
1/3 cup soy sauce

1/3 cup rice vinegar

3 tbsp. hoisin sauce

1 tbsp. oyster sauce

1 tbsp. fish sauce  
2 tbsp. sambal                                                      

3 tbsp. brown sugar                                              

2 tbsp. sesame oil                                                 

3 tbsp. mirin                                                         

2 inches peeled fresh ginger
6 cloves garlic, chopped 

1 Asian pear, peeled, cored & chopped coarsely
1/4 cup dry sherry

For the Meat:
1 1/2 lbs. bulgogi pork or beef
1 large white onion, sliced thickly
3 carrots, sliced diagonally
2 tbsp. olive oil
1 tsp. sesame oil
1/2 piece of fresh ginger, grated
salt & pepper to taste

All marinated up!

For the marinade, dump all the ingredients into a blender or food processor and blend smooth.  Pour marinade over the meat in a zip top bag, or use your favorite marinating container.  Overnight is best, in my opinion; I just threw everything together right after breakfast and it was fine by dinnertime.

Confession:  I took pictures of everything in the blender, but it was so blurry I was too embarrassed to include it here!

Simmering, simmer, simmer!

When you're ready to start prepping for your meal, pull the meat out of the fridge and remove from marinade, transferring to a platter or dish so it can come to room temperature while you prepare the veggies.  Dump the remaining marinade into a small saucepan over medium heat and slowly bring to a simmer.

For the said veggies... you can use anything you like; I chose to just chop up an onion and a couple of carrots and saute them with a little olive oil, salt, ginger and sesame oil.  I like the onions to retain a little integrity - i.e., not to become too soft - but I don't like raw carrots in my cooked meals, so I blanch my carrot slices for about five minutes before draining them and adding them to the stir fry with the onions.  Again, you can pop in any veggies in season, (baby bok choy would work really well!) or just do without and serve this with seaweed salad or whatever you like.

Place a little olive oil in a wok or saute pan and add the pieces of meat, using tongs to get them positioned so that they're flat.  If you got the right kind of meat, the pieces will try to curl up and fold over on themselves, so you have to help them out a little.  I could fit about five pieces in at a time; when browned a bit, I then just stacked them on top of each other on one side of the pan and added a few more pieces.  There will be plenty of residual marinade, so it'll be kind of saucy, and not particularly pretty, as you can see.

Now you can add your veggies and the extra marinade.  By simmering it for the length of time it takes you to brown the meat, it will have thickened slightly and, of course, cooked through the meat juices that you wouldn't want to eat raw!

Mix everything together, and it's time to turn the heat down to low, cover, and simmer for about 15 minutes, until the meat is quite tender.

A note before the next picture... the quantities of spices I used will yield a dish that would garner at least 2 little chili peppers beside its listing on a menu.  We didn't find it very hot; in fact, as you will see below, when I taste tested at one point, it definitely needed more sambal... but then again, we really like things hot.  I wish I had remembered that there were some leftover Serrano chiles in my freezer, or I would have added those as well!

More sambal, please!

So, that's pretty much it.  When everything is tender and you've adjusted the seasoning to your taste, serve it up with some sticky rice and top with a bit of cilantro if you like, and maybe some more hot sauce. ;)