A Day Off

Last week we were crazy busy trying to meet deadlines. We loaded and fired a bisque in the gas kiln, unloaded it the next day, and spent two days glazing and loading it again. The kiln is at 145 degrees this morning, so we will unload shortly. Fingers crossed for a great firing! 

In between the pottery work, I started prepping and painting our master bedroom bath. Next on the list is to re-caulk the tub, so that we will have a second, fully functioning bathroom by the time our Korean guests arrive.

Yesterday we took a well deserved break. Our good friend Bonnie turned 60 and we celebrated with a great party at her daughter's home in Greensboro. After the party we did some shopping at the Korean market, no trip to G'boro is complete without an excursion to Super Gmart. While Jeff gathered everything needed to make kimchi, I found all the ingredients to make Dak Galbi, a recipe that I had been wanting to try.

 Dak Galbi is a spicy chicken and vegetable dish. It really is very simple to make. The vegetables are rough chopped cabbage, Korean sweet potato, onion, carrot, sesame leaves.

I think the main reason I wanted to try this dish is that it also includes tteok! Tteok is rice cake. Think of it as a dense pasta. Totally yummy, especially when covered in a spicy sauce. While it is called rice cake, it does contain wheat so it is not gluten free.

In Korea, Dak Galbi would be cooked in a very large cast iron pan. Mine isn't big enough, but this deep skillet got the job done. The ingredients are layered in a hot pan, with a thin layer of vegetable oil. Chopped, boneless chicken thighs on the top, then a hot pepper paste spread over it. Some recipes marinated the chicken in the paste.

 As the vegetables cook, they release their liquid and create a delicious sauce as the pepper paste is incorporated into it. 20-30 minutes and it's done!

At a Korean restaurant, everyone would eat from the large pan, sometimes wrapping their food in sesame leaves. Once the pan is empty, the cook quickly fries some rice in the sauce that is left in the pan. Since we had some leftover rice in the fridge we did just that. DELICIOUS! It was the perfect ending to a Sunday off.