My journey of eating away a whole chicken is complete (for now). I hope this series at least showed you different possibilities of Korean (-related) dishes you can get out of a whole chicken or just an idea of another chicken dish you can make next time.
The most time consuming preparation is done on the day you break down a chicken, but also the rewards are worthwhile. For me, making chicken stock can be a relaxing, calming activity on a rainy day.
Besides, chicken stock is a base for many dishes – Korean or not – so it’s always good to have some in the freezer.
Add a few seasonal ingredients to the stock with noodles and serve yourself a bowl of dak kalguksu (닭칼국수), a Korean version of chicken noodle soup. If you are up for it, you can make the noodles too!
Then your treats begin on another night. Good as banchan (반찬; side dish accompanying rice), but if you are looking for some Korean Fried Chicken anju (안주; side dish accompanying alcoholic beverages), here is one that’s updated from my mom’s version.
Don’t forget about our own chicken nuggets with a couple of simple, healthful ingredients including tofu and potato cream, dipped in honey-mustard sauce!
The funniest thing I’ve gotten in the last week while running this chicken series was a spam mail from a chicken feet importer. In case anyone is wondering, I am not affiliated with any chicken business whatsoever.
Now go get your own chicken while I take a little break from all dishes chicken after this chicken marathon…
Today is chobok (초복), marking the first of boknal (복날), which are the three hottest days of the year by lunar calendar. Although chicken is popular in Korea all year long, samgyetang (삼계탕; hot chicken soup with traditional medicinal herbs, including ginseng) is the most popular boknal dish. My guess is that only a turkey on Thanksgiving would understand how a chicken on boknal feels. You might understand the concept of yi yeol chi yeol (이열치열; to relieve heat with heat) and accept the Korean custom of eating hot food in the summer. Even then, if you just can’t take a big bowl of hot chicken soup on a hot sticky day, here is an option for you.
Chogyetang (초계탕) is a chilled chicken soup originated from the northern regions of Korea (which falls in the territory of North Korea). The name comes from the soup’s main seasoning of vinegar (식초; shik cho) and mustard (겨자; gyeo ja, but pronounced as gye ja with the regional accent). While it is not as well known as other chicken dishes or summer dishes of Korea, the chilled, tangy broth with well seasoned chicken makes it a great dish that is sure to revive your appetite on a hot summer day.
For a light meal, buckwheat noodle (메밀면; me mil myeon) is often added to the broth, which can be a nice alternative to naengmyeon (냉면), arguably the most popular cold noodle dish in the summer. For me, a smaller portion with just chicken and crunchy cucumber garnish without the noodles makes it a cooling summer appetizer.
I learned that a proper chogyetang made with some 25 herbs and vegetables was worthy to be part of the royal court cuisine. Even for a simplified version, it would take a few more steps to make this dish if we didn’t already have chicken stock and shredded chicken meat chilled in the refrigerator as part of eating away a whole chicken. Now, you can leisurely make it yourself at home with this simplified version of chogyetang.
Chogyetang (Chilled Chicken Soup)
Serves 2
INGREDIENTS 4 cups Chicken Stock 4 tsp. Soy Sauce 1/4 tsp. Salt 2 tsp. Vinegar 2 tsp. Sugar Juice from half a lemon 1 cup Shredded Chicken Breast Meat 1 tsp. Dijon Mustard 2 cloves Garlic, grated 1 Scallion Stem, finely chopped 1 Tbsp. Fresh Ginger, grated 1 Tbsp. Honey Black Pepper, to taste 1 short Cucumber, half moon slices (garnish) 1 Tbsp. Sea Salt (garnish) Sauteed Mushrooms (garnish, optional) 1 Egg, boiled or fried (garnish, optional) 1 Carrot, julienned (garnish, optional) Buckwheat Noodles (optional)
Soup Seasoning
If frozen, defrost 4 cups of chicken stock in the refrigerator overnight. Strain chicken stock for clear broth base. Add 2 tsp. of soy sauce, 1/4 tsp. of salt, 2 tsp. of vinegar, 2 tsp. of sugar, juice from 1/2 lemon and stir to mix. Adjust seasoning with salt to taste. Keep in the refrigerator.
Chicken Seasoning
If frozen, defrost 1 cup of shredded chicken breast meat in the refrigerator overnight. Mix 2 tsp. of soy sauce, 2 tsp. Dijon mustard, 2 cloves of grated garlic, 1 finely chopped scallion stem, 1 Tbsp. of fresh grated ginger, 1 Tbsp. honey and fresh ground black pepper to taste.
Mix the seasoning with the meat. Let rest for 15-20 minutes in the refrigerator.
Cucumber Garnish
Cut 1 short cucumber (I used one Kirby cucumber) into half-moon slices and mix with 1 Tbsp. of sea salt. Let rest for 30 minutes or until the cucumber slices have wilted slightly. Wash off salt in cold water, drain well, then refrigerate.
Other garnish options) sauteed mushrooms, a boiled or fried egg (white and yolk separately), carrot cut to thin strips
Chogyetang Assembly
Place the chilled broth, seasoned meat, and salted cucumber garnish in 2 bowls. Float a couple of chicken stock ice cubes and finish with a sprinkle of toasted sesame seeds.
Feel free to add buckwheat noodles (메밀면; me mil myeon), cooked as directed in the package, to the soup. If you are making it as an appetizer, reduce the stock to 2-3 cups for two portions and adjust the recipe accordingly.
Next, we will finish this chicken series by cooking off the last bag of chicken meat in the freezer, which you should move to the refrigerator to defrost slowly.
It seems that the growing popularity of Korean chicken in recent years has amounted to a “cult of crunchy, spicy, perfectly nongreasy chicken” which is only getting bigger with the quest for perfect Korean chicken recipes. The fairly new, endearing term of ‘the other KFC’ referring to ‘Korean Fried Chicken,’ recipes featured on various sites, from David Lebovitz to more recently in Saveur and Serious Eats, or more of a kitchen lab experiment done by ZenKimchi are all pretty amazing to me who grew up eating a version of this KFC at home without putting much thought into it.
To offload some self-imposed pressure I feel as a Korean person offering another fried chicken recipe, I’d like to start with a disclaimer. This is not one of the popular Korean fried chicken chain recipe secrets. This is an updated version of what my mom used to whip up in a few minutes – lightly pan-frying chicken drumsticks then coating in the sauce of gochujang (고추장, Korean hot pepper paste), ketchup (yes, ketchup!) and corn syrup. Simple. Quick. Delicious. My sister and I devoured them every time.
This pan-fried chicken recipe is also a friendlier version for home cooks, especially for those like me who live in shoebox apartments that hold deep-frying smell for days. You can just use drumsticks or wings, but since we’re trying to make the most out of buying a whole chicken, we’ll make use of what we have now in this post.
INGREDIENTS
Seasoning
Salt Pepper Approx. 1 TBSP fresh grated Ginger
Sauce
1/4 cup Gochujang 1/4 cup Ketchup 1 Tbsp. Sesame Oil 1 Tbsp. Soy Sauce 2 cloves Garlic, grated 1/2 Onion, peeled and grated
1/4 cup Corn Syrup (you can substitute with honey, but you will lose the shiny stickiness of corn syrup)
2 Tbsp. Almonds (or any other nuts), toasted and chopped
Coating
Corn Starch and Sweet Rice Flour (찹쌀가루; chap ssal ga ru) = 1: 1 –> in this case, 1/4 cup and 1/4 cup would be enough
Sift to mix completely. You can also just use any starch powder alone.
If frozen, defrost the chicken legs, thighs and wings slowly in the refrigerator overnight. Cut off the top of the wings and discard. Cut each thigh into 2-3 pieces, so you have 8-10 pieces total (2 legs, 2 wings and 4-6 pieces from thighs). Pat dry with paper towel, then rub each piece with fresh grated ginger and its juice. Season with salt and pepper and let them rest for 30 minutes to an hour.
Make the sauce by mixing gochujang, ketchup, sesame oil, soy sauce, garlic and onion. In order to bring out the sweet onion flavor and meld all the flavors together, cook over low heat, stirring once in a while. You will see the sauce getting reduced and thicken slightly. Remove from heat, add corn syrup and stir to combine. Add toasted, chopped almonds (or any other nuts) and stir. Set aside.
Dredge the chicken pieces in corn starch and sweet rice flour mix, and place them on a hot pan with vegetable oil enough to cover the bottom of the pan. Fill up the pan with all the chicken pieces if possible to minimize oil splattering. Pan-fry over medium-low heat to cook through, without burning the skin of the meat. Flip once to the other side when the bottom part turns golden. Check for doneness when both sides are golden which should be about 10 minutes of cooking.
Coat the chicken pieces in the sauce and mix well. Now it’s ready as banchan (반찬; side dish accompanying rice) or as anju (안주; side dish accompanying alcoholic beverages) with beer or soju!
Time to take out a container of chicken stock (4 cups) and a bag of chicken breast meat from the freezer and move them to the refrigerator – we’ll be making some chilled chicken soup appropriate for the summer!
The most common recipe question I get and the most common request I find on forums, “How do you make Korean fried chicken?”
It’s a great mystery, even in Korea. With my cultural background and family history, along with a lot of experimentation, I’ve become pretty good in the fried chicken arts–at least in the Southern fried chicken territory. In the past, I have also succeeded in mimicking the flavor of my favorite Korean chicken brand, Two Two Chicken, which is the classic fried chicken hof style. The hard part is getting the texture right.
The real Two Two Chicken
Eun Jeong and I went on the internet. We also checked out a TV program that quickly went behind the scenes of a chicken joint but didn’t divulge the secrets. I found a few recipes for Korean fried chicken, like this one in The New York Times from the cookbook Quick and Easy Korean Cooking (Cecilia Hae-Jin Lee), but none of them sounded like what we have in Korea. Eun Jeong checked Korean sites, and none of them sounded definitive. We then had a little pow wow about what we’ve heard over the years in Korean fried chicken techniques.
We decided to try three different approaches from our research to mimic the Two Two style.
Starch Only
Starch and Flour (3:2 ratio)
Starch and Water (thick slurry)
We used potato starch, but corn starch is more available in American kitchens. To each of them, I added the flavorings.
2 tsp. Chinese Five Spice
1 tsp. Garlic Powder
1/2 tsp. Ginger Powder
1 tsp. Salt
1/2 tsp. Ground Cinnamon
1/2 tsp. Black Pepper
Two Two has a distinctive Chinese five spice scent, particularly star anise, with a touch of cinnamon. You can smell it whenever you’re in the vicinity of a chicken hof.
For an added bonus, I also experimented with making the Kyochon Chicken style. Kyochon is batter-based and has a deep garlic flavor with a little sweetness.
1/4 c. Starch
1/4 c. Flour
1 Tbsp. Garlic Powder
2 cloves Garlic, crushed
2 tsp. Sugar
1 tsp. Ginger Powder
1/2 tsp. Black Pepper
1 tsp. Salt
1 tsp. Baking Soda
Water (enough to make a thick batter)
Since my primary goal was hitting the right texture, I didn’t bother to marinate the chicken. You can do that step if you want to. A diluted solution of raspberry vinegar is my preferred choice, but use any acidic marinade you want.
Chicken in this part of the world isn’t cut on the joints like western chicken. It’s hacked into bite-sized pieces with a Chinese cleaver or shears. It turns it into a challenge when trying to distinguish white and dark meat. But keeping it small helps it fry more quickly and evenly and works well for group eating. I should also note that a lot of restaurants fry chicken halves or quarters and hack them up after frying.
Breaking out my candy thermometer, I heated some vegetable oil between 300 to 350 degrees F. I had two or three pieces for each style and fried them separately for around five minutes each, draining them in a colander before putting them in their own little bowls. Here we go.
When they had all finished, I pumped up the oil to 375 degrees F. I then fried them a second time for around 2-3 minutes.
FINISHED. Now for judging.
Starch Only
This one looked very close to the Two Two style. The skin was papery and crinkled. The breading was light. Eun Jeong and I tasted it. Our conclusion–it was light but not crispy enough. In fact, it was a little rubbery and powdery. But it was close.
Starch and Flour
This looked heavier than what we got at the restaurants. Eun Jeong thought it looked the same. When we bit into them, we felt they were just about right. Just needed a little more salt.
Starch and Water
Scary looking. Eun Jeong liked this a little bit. I spit it out into the sink.
Kyochon Batter
We hit this one on the target. Glassy shatter on the crust. The inside exploded with juice. The taste was strong in garlic with a hint of sweet. In hindsight, I don’t think double frying was necessary.
So the winners were the Kyochon Batter and the Starch-and-Flour mixture. Here are the formal recipes.
Two Two Chicken (TTC)
INGREDIENTS
Chicken, cut up
2/3 cup Corn Starch (or Potato Starch)
1/3 cup All-purpose Flour
1 Tbsp. Chinese Five Spice
2 tsp. Garlic Powder
1 tsp. Ginger Powder
1 Tbsp. Salt
1 tsp. Ground Cinnamon
1 tsp. Black Pepper
Oil, for frying
METHOD
1. Rinse and dry the chicken.
2. Combine all the dry ingredients. Heat the oil to 300 degrees F, not going over 350 degrees F.
3. Dredge the chicken pieces in the dry mixture and dust off so that there is just a light dusting on the chicken.
4. Fry just a few pieces at a time for around 5 minutes.
5. Drain the chicken and increase the oil temperature to 375 degrees F.
6. Fry the chicken a second time for 2-3 minutes to get a crispy texture.
7. Drain and serve immediately.
Kyochon Fried Chicken
INGREDIENTS
1 Chicken, cut up
1/4 c. Starch
1/4 c. Flour
1 Tbsp. Garlic Powder
2 cloves Garlic, crushed
2 tsp. Sugar
1 tsp. Ginger Powder
1/2 tsp. Black Pepper
1 tsp. Salt
1 tsp. Baking Soda
Water (enough to make a thick batter)
Oil, for frying
1. Rinse and dry the chicken.
2. Combine all the dry ingredients. Add water a little at a time until it becomes a thick batter, like pancake batter.
3. Heat the oil to 350 degrees F.
4. Dip the chicken pieces, one at a time, in the batter. Let the excess drip off and fry them in the oil for around five minutes. Don’t overcrowd. Fry just a few at a time.
5. Drain and serve immediately.
BONUS: Yangnyeom Sauce
The reason a lot of people love Korean fried chicken is the garlicky pepper sauce. You can glaze the chicken with this or use it as a dipping sauce. I’ve seen many versions of this on the internet, and I’ve broken it down to its essential components. You can add anything extra you want, such as pureed pineapple, apple or kiwi, which some restaurants do. Replace the corn syrup with honey. My version is very peppery. What you’re trying to accomplish is a shimmering glaze that’s fruity, garlicky, slightly salty and smooth with a good pepper kick. I’ve seen recipes that dilute it with ketchup, but no ketchup dares go near my fried chicken, bubba.
Yangnyeom Sauce
INGREDIENTS
1/2 cup Gochujang (Korean red pepper paste)
1/4 cup Corn Syrup
1 Tbsp. Sesame Oil
4 cloves Garlic, crushed
1 Tbsp. Soy Sauce
2 tsp. Rice Vinegar
METHOD
1. Mix all the ingredients in a saucepan.
2. Heat slowly until it bubbles and the garlic has time to soften and steep. Be careful not to burn.
3. Drench the chicken in the sauce and garnish with sesame seeds.
So here we finally have Korean fried chicken recipes on the internet from Korea itself, based on the flavors of real Korean chicken hofs. Try this at home and add any techniques, observations or critiques in the comments. Like all restaurant copycat recipes, these aren’t exact but pretty close.
More along the theme of cooking as many man foods as I can while the wife is away, I also got a hankerin’ for some chicken wings. The challenge was that I couldn’t find a decent hot sauce at a decent price. But… DUH… I have red pepper paste. Gochujang 고추장. So, how to make this into Buffalo wing sauce?
Turned out it was pretty easy. Just think ddeokbokki. In a saucepan I simmered the following:
3 big dollops Gochujang (I guess around 1/2 cup)
3 tablespoons Rice Vinegar
2 teaspoons Sugar
3 cloves Garlic, crushed
1/2 cup Butter
It didn’t need any salt because the gochujang is salty enough, and the red peppers give the sauce a dark fruity character that really worked on chicken wings.
Since my wifey is away, I deep fried the wings instead of baking them. I also got myself a batch of sundae with extra liver to mix with the sauce, one of my nasty guilty pleasures. There was no ranch dressing or blue cheese available, but I can get my hands on bottle Caesar dressing, which makes a great substitute.
>
I’m going to make wing sauce like this from now on.
I got the news about North Korea from the Marmot’s Hole very early. Sort of not surprised. A little worried. But before I came to Korea and since then, I have given much thought to the possibility of the impossibility. I’ve had a good time to think about it, so I’m not shocked completely.
Nonetheless, I decided to make some comfort food. A Fried Chicken Salad.
This came about when I worked as a cook for Yucatan Sam’s, a little Tex-Mex place in Fairhope, Alabama, that no longer exists. The owner’s wife regularly asked for this fried chicken salad we had on the menu for lunch. I wondered why anyone would eat a salad for a meal. And why would anyone ruin the positive effects of a salad by putting fried chicken in it?
I had gone through and eaten most everything on the menu after a few months. I had even started experimenting with new recipes to add to the menu. So I decided to make the fried chicken salad for myself.
It ended up being one of my favorite things on the menu. And it’s something you can make easily in Korea.
WHAT YOU NEED
Lettuce Grab whatever fresh greens you like from the lettuce counter at the store. Make sure you clean them, though. One of the things I like about Korean grocery stores is how aunaturel produce is. Carrots come with mud caked on them, as do ginger roots. They haven’t been over processed. They’ve basically have gone from the dirt to the produce aisle. So wash the lettuce and other veggies you want to add.
Onion Just a single white onion. I like to shave it thin in my slicer using a fork stuck at the very end to protect my hand from the razor blade.
Fried Chicken I like to make this when I have leftover fried chicken in the house. Other times, I just buy a bag of frozen chicken nuggets. I fry them in some oil and drain them for the salad. Throw some seasoning on them when they come out of the oil. Whatever you feel like adding (cinnamon not suggested, though).
Croutons Don’t buy the bagged toasted garlic baguettes at the Korean bakery. I made the mistake during Foreigner Chuseok and came out with sugary garlic croutons. Nasty on salad. It’s best to make your own.
Cut up some bread you have around the house. A baguette is perfect. Fry the cubes with some butter and chopped garlic until the bread has absorbed it all. Then put it in the toaster oven until they turn out like croutons.
Assembly Throw everything together in a big bowl and top it off with some cheese, if you have any. I usually use honey mustard as a dressing because that’s how we did it at Yucatan’s.
So, if it’s the end of the world as we know it, I’m just gonna sit down with my Fried Chicken Salad and watch The Colbert Report.
