Food Network's interpretation of Korean cooking

Thanks to reader Outre for pointing this out.

It looks like the Food Network thinks like former Top Chef contestants in that all Asian food is the same.  This is their recipe and photo for Slow Cooked Korean-style Short Rib Soup.  What the Food Network Kitchens give us is a recipe for what looks like pho.  The big hint that it’s not Korean is the cilantro and lime, considering cilantro is having a hard time penetrating the Korean market, and limes are almost impossible to find.  They’re the unicorns of produce in Korea.

KOREAN FAIL.

Let’s go to the comments for this recipe, shall we?

My husband and I are huge fans of asian cuisine, but we have never had Korean food before, this was a perfect introduction to… the flavors of Korean food. The soup is spicy, but the cucumbers, cilantro, lime and carrots help ass some sweetness to the spicy! I also use pork instead of beef because my husband has an allergy to beef, it is just as good! I would recommend this to anyone and everyone! Amazing dish!

And from Marliyn in Hawaii

This is a great recipe, and for the life of us, we can’t understand what all the grumbling is about! Beef short ribs are… fatty by nature! Using a gravy separator to pour off fat, save broth, will easily take care of that problem. Cilantro leaf is the same thing as chinese parsley, an asian food staple. It is part of what makes this dish so authentic! Yes, there is a lot of chili paste called for: that is a normal amount for korean food. We found this recipe to be right on the money for authentic Korean cuisine. My husband’s hairdresser from Seoul, Korea thought these ribs needed more chili paste than called for in the recipe.

Her husband’s hairdresser thinks it’s authentic, so it must be.  Wait… her husband’s hairdresser?  Who takes a bowl of soup when to the beauty salon?

But some people saw through the emperor’s clothes.

i’ m korean and i have never heard of this before lol.

And a recent comment from New Jersey

I don’t know what food network was thinking claiming this recipe is ‘Korean-style’. It’s clearly Southeast Asian-style. People ignorantly assume Asia is all the same but it’s not. Just because there are soy sauce and Korean chili paste(which is ok to sub with sambal oelek, not a Korean spice) in the recipe doesn’t make it Korean. Cilantro and lime, are not, and never have been part of traditional or modern Korean cuisine… or Japanese. Some part of China uses cilantro, but not all of China. This is Pho recipe in disguise. All of you have been fooled into FN into thinking you’ve tried a Korean dish, I can assure you, this isn’t. They really need to do more research. It’s a shame they’d post a recipe that takes longer to cook than most recipes and can’t even put it in the right cuisine type.

Note to the Food Network and middle America: please do a little research.  Even Wikipedia.

Maybe America views Asian cuisines these days similar to how it viewed Mexican in the 1950s and 1960s.  There was a recipe in the classic Gallery of Regrettable Foods from a mid-twentieth century cookbook for a Mexican casserole, but the only thing that made it remotely Mexican was a bit of chili powder, which was optional.

I still stand by my conviction that Pizza School has the best pepperoni for the price you pay.  Since they cater to school children, they also have some pretty whacky offerings.  This is the latest one to come out: Pork Rib Pizza.

Bone-in pork ribs on a pizza.  Hey, I was a fan of the old Pizza Hut BBQ pizza in the late ’80s.  This may not be so bad.  In fact, as far as flavor, it wasn’t.  Get yourself a mouthful of barbecue and then a bit of pizza and it wasn’t an unpleasant experience.

But I did notice something.  The bones were a little, um, squishy.  The ultimate disgust happened when I bit into a rib and bit right through.  The bone disintegrated like jelly.  I stopped eating the pizza right there and felt like I was going to throw up during much of the day.  Trying to think of what violent processing went on to make a pork rib fall apart like wet cardboard and what it was doing to my insides at that very moment.

Gonna stick with the pepperoni.

Rob at Seoul Eats reports that Post, the cereal makers, have a recipe for a cereal sandwich to add to the sandwich abominations that infest Korean bakeries and picnics.

Who designed this?  Ally Sheedy’s character in Breakfast Club?  What?  No Pixy Sticks involved?

Outside of American chains, has anyone seen a Korean sandwich that doesn’t look like it was assembled by a five-year-old let loose in the kitchen?

There’s a fine line between awesomeness and stupidity.  Guess which side of the line I ended up on?

I’m alive.  And a bit banged up.

Smarter?  Only time will tell.

I wonder what Anthony Bourdain would say about this.

My apologies to Andrew Zimmern and the crew of Bizarre Foods.  I had no idea this existed until this week.

I called my friend Soo-jung to tell her the Bizarre Foods episode was coming out.  She’s the one who introduced me to fermented skate and subsequently ate it with Andrew on the show.  She told me we should meet up this Friday with her golf buddies.

“You ever have horse meat?”

I met her friends at a little second floor restaurant in a building I regularly go to for buying ESL books.  Never noticed it before.

When I sat down, her friends were already eating some pork.  Yet a plate of Mr. Ed was also sitting out, ready for grilling.  Now, if I didn’t tell you it was horse meat, you’d drool.  Look at it.

Deep red.  Lean.  Full of iron.

When grilled, I dipped it in a little vinegared pepper sauce.

The taste?

I was expecting something gamey, like lamb.  But it was like a straightforward beef.  I was struck by how tender it was.  I didn’t ask what part of the horse it came from, but my guess is the tenderloin.  Strong red meat flavor.  But I had to be more certain.  There’s only one way to find out.

Mmm… horse sashimi!

Look how little fat is there!  It tasted like the reddest tuna and was almost as soft.  Not much chewing going on there.

Yet being as clever as Koreans are, I couldn’t resist the horse meat being transformed into one of the greatest dishes of Korean cuisine…

Yuk Hui 육회.

I’ve said before that Yuk Hui beats the pants off of any Parisian steak tartare.  In this case, the horse meat is sliced into ribbons and mixed with sesame oil, big chunks of raw garlic and pine nuts served on a bed of julienned Korean pear.

Fruity.  Nutty.  Garlicky.  Many layers of flavors with that rich iron beefiness.  The mouthfeel was chilly, soft and slippery with the sesame oil.  It was so slippery that it was hard to chew without it just sliding down my throat.

I ate so much of this, that Soo-jung’s golf friends just put the plate in front of me to finish.

Then came another great surprise.

Samgyeopsal 삼겹살.

But Joe, that’s not anything special.

Yes, but this is Ddong Dwaeji Samgyeopsal 똥 돼지 삼겹살, the famous “poo pig.”

I was disappointed–okay, relieved–to again confirm that none of these pigs fed off of human feces, like the name implies.  It’s more of a name given to the black pigs of Jeju Island.

The owner had sat down with us and told me that there is such great competition amongst Jeju pig farmers that they really take care of their pigs.  They’re free range and live like pigs are supposed to live.  Happy pigs.

See that?  That’s a happy pig.

Sweet, sweet pork.  Sweet, sweet, sweet, sweet pork.  The juices from the fat explode flavor all over the mouth.  Americans have no idea what real pork should taste like–well, ones that depend on the bland pork from the local megamarket.

So, Friday night’s dinner was Jeju Halla Pork.

And happy Jeju horse.

Heh, didn’t know horses had fingers.

Update:

I went back to the building and found out the name.   Look in the comments for directions.  Or rather, go out exit one.  Pass NC Department Store.  Cross the street and cross left, in effect, going diagonally.  Look for a Family Mart.  It’s on the second floor of that building with this sign.

Our friend Brian first brought this new glorious product to my attention.  It’s not just the Ministry of Agriculture that could use someone outside the circle as a consultant.  The snack makers at Lotte maybe could have–should have–run this by a native English speaker before throwing it out there on the market.  This was no problem before when Korea was pretty much a closed society, and there was no internet–or snarky bloggers on the internet.

Let’s get Ricetarded (ha), let’s get Ricetarded in here!

What do we have here?

It’s a basic little spongecake-based snack cake.  These custard ones have been getting popular in Korea in the past couple of years.  Last year, a cheese flavored one came out that kicked ass.  Oh, props should go out to Dan of Seoul Eats for donating the super-mini tripod (along with the camera he donated much earlier), which lets me take better shots in low light.

So, what’s in a Ricetard?

I just love saying that word.  Say it with me.

RICETARD.

Yes, the word comes from a blend of “rice” and “custard.” But it’s not a rice custard.  The cake uses rice flour.  They point out many times on the package that it uses 100-percent Korean rice.  This may be one of those campaigns, like the ddeokbokki/topokki one, that is trying to save Korean rice farmers from international competition.

The filling is vanilla-flavored cream and what they call “orange jam.”

“But Zen, isn’t it full of trans fats and all that unhealthy gunk?”

No, bubba.  See that guy in the doctor’s coat?  It’s well-being.  It has vitamins B1 and B2 along with niacin.  That healthy, bro.

Oh… hmph…. mwo mwa fhwf mwafhf…sorry… was eating my Ricetard.  It tastes like any other snack cake–more like a Twinkie.  You can see there’s a hint of that so-called orange jam, but I didn’t taste it in the sea of sugar.  Lemme try again.

Hmm… nope.  Well, okay, there’s a hint of something in the middle of that petroleum jelly textured “cream.” Maybe it’s the orange jam.  May have to try another one.  Talk to ya later.

Oh yeah!  Continuin’ my love for abominations against nature, I had to try the new pizza from our favorite cheap grease bucket Pizza School, the Carbone Pizza 까르보네 피자.  When I made out the description, I just had to try it.  I figured that even if it didn’t taste good it would make for an interesting blog post.

Here it is.  Two different sauces, a red and white.  Cheese.  Oh, sorry, “cheese.” Thin slices of loin ham.  Pasta.

Yes, they threw spaghetti on the pizza.  And you know what?  It’s my new favorite pizza from da School.  The co-workers seemed to like it, too.  Well, they didn’t dislike it, and they each later bought a whole pie for themselves.

What I like about it is it is very garlicky.  Don’t go for a job interview or a date after eating this.  And for all of our sakes, don’t take public transportation.  Then again, this is a country that’s in competition with Italy for garlic consumption.

If you are suffering from a starch deficit or you have just realized how stupid you were to follow the quack Atkin’s diet this will help out.  The pasta actually doesn’t detract from the pizza.  It gives it a welcome chewy texture.  The ham just gets lost in the garlic.

There’s not much more to say about it.  It’s 8,000 won.  It’s highly garlicky, creamy and chewy.  I dare you to try it.

Didn’t try it, though.  I ate the one on the right.

Gamer Grub.

So this stuff has all these special vitamins added to it and different ingredients in each one. According to Kotaku, the flavors currently work like this:

Action Pizza: Which is a jar of Pizza Cashews & Pitas, Tomato Sesame Sticks, Tomato Almonds, Cheese Pitas and Mozzarella Peanuts.

Racing Wasabi: Which is Wasabi Soy Almonds and Peanuts, Wasabi Peas, Honey Mustard Sesame Sticks and Pita Chips.

Strategy Chocolate: Which is Almonds, Chocolate Raisins, Cherries, White Chocolate Chips.

and

Sports PB&J: Peanuts, Peanut Butter Chips, Strawberry Jelly Chips, Bread Cubes.