Maangchi - Maangchis Real Korean Cooking: Authentic Dishes for the Home Cook

Clockwise from top left, L.A. YouTube studio; shooting in the Netherlands with a fan; a fishmarket in Mexico; eating noodles with black bean paste in L.A.; taking photos in my N.Y. kitchen.

For those of you who arent already my old friends, let me introduce myself. Im not a professional chef. I didnt go to culinary school. Ive never owned or worked in a restaurant. But as long as I can remember, Ive been fascinated by foodeating it, of course, but also by how it was made, and how I could make it myself at home.

I was born in Imsil in North Jeolla Province and raised in Yeosu, South Korea, which is on the southernmost tip of South Jeolla, the southernmost province of the peninsula. Korea is a nation of food lovers. In daily life, delicious food is a given, to be devoured with gusto, and so it goes without saying that no party, no vacation, no occasion happens without something special being prepared. South Jeolla Province has a reputation for its wonderful food, and the people of Yeosu have the ability to make any type of fish that comes from surrounding waters taste incredible. Their dishes may be spicy or not, raw or fermented, and stewed, braised, or roasted over charcoal. My father owned and ran a fish auction business, and fishermen came from all over to sell their fish there. In gratitude, they often left my family samples of their best catch. We werent rich by a long shot, but we always had great seafood.

From an early age, I was interested in what my mom, grandmother, and aunts were cooking and would quietly determine who made the best version of each dish. I also watched the women in the marketplace who were known for certain special dishes and paid close attention to how they made them.

I was a very social kid and a real organizer. I would schedule lunches with my friends, telling each one which dish or ingredient to bring to school that day. When we put everything together, wed have a meal all the other kids would envya real feast of bibimbap, the one-dish rice meal full of tasty components like sunny-side-up eggs, hot pepper paste, cooked soybean sprouts, sesame oil, and various other colorful vegetables.

I was sent off to high school in Seoul, where my family thought I would get a better education. Moving to the big city on my own was thrilling, and it gave me a chance to cook more. The friends I made in school were all foodies. Whenever we had free time on a weekend, we would cook something at one of our houses.

One of my favorite things has always been sharing my knowledge, so after finishing high school, I went to teachers college in Seoul and got a certificate in social studies. University life convinced me that I wanted to be a college professor, and so I got a masters degree in education. I became a teaching assistant and then a research assistant and a part-time professor, but before I could start my career in earnest, I got married. My husband was a university professor as well, and when he got a posting in the city of Gwangju, in South Jeolla Province, we moved south, and I put my dream of being a full professor on hold to build our family.

I had a son and then a daughter, and my passion for cooking turned toward my little family. I poured everything I had into making the best food I could for them. While the children were still young, my husband got the chance to study for his PhD in Columbia, Missouri. I was apprehensive about moving to the United States, but I knew it would be good for the children to learn English at a young age, and it would be good for my husbands career, so off we went.

Missouri was an eye-opener for me. Part of it was living in America, of course, but part of it was the Korean expat community I found there. The small group of people had come from all over the country, and we helped and encouraged each otherand shared delicious home-cooked Korean meals at epic potluck parties. Every woman brought her best dishes, and as we ate them, we discussed how they were made. As a result, I learned about many regional recipes that I would never have tasted if I hadnt left Korea.

When my husband finished his degree, our family moved back to Korea. But after my children grew up, my husband and I divorced, and I returned to North America to start over in Toronto. I did all kinds of things to make a living: I was a cashier in my neighborhood grocery store, a movie extra, a translator, and an interpreter, and I also taught English grammar to Korean immigrants and students. It was difficult to be so far from my daughter, who was in college in Korea, and my son, who was working in Silicon Valley, but I was trying so many new things that it was always interesting, and I was grateful that I could make a living and be independent.