Napa Cabbage Kimchi, recreating this Korean Recipe is one of my favorite childhood memories as a kid sitting, and watching next right to my mom, while she was making kimchi, I, on the other hand, would ask for bites.
The prepping time for this Napa Cabbage Kimchi recipe is quite long and tedious one, the steps are 3 threefold! First, you have to prepare the main ingredients, second, the sweet rice porridge and lastly, the kimchi seasoning sauce as well.
Main Ingredients:
- 4 heads napa cabbage, 7 lbs
- 3 cups Korean sea salt
- 15 cups water
- 1 small Korean radish
Sweet rice porridge:
- 2 cups water
- 3 tbsp sweet rice flour
Kimchi seasoning:
- 1 bunch chives
- 1 bunch of water celery/dropwort
- 6 green onions
- 1/2 Korean pear
- 1/2 apple
- 1 red bell pepper
- 6 garlic cloves
- 1 tsp ginger
- 2 cups Korean red pepper powder
- 1/4 cup fish sauce
- 2 tbsp Korean shrimp paste
- 2 tbsp sesame seeds
- 1 tbsp Chung-gak seaweed (optional)
Napa Cabbage prep:
- Slice just a little into the ends of the cabbage and tear the rest.
- Pour 15 cups of water into a basin
- Add 1 cup of Korean sea salt to the 15 cups of water
- Bathe the cabbage, make sure to get the saltwater in between the leaves.
- After soaking, set aside the napa cabbage.
- In a separate basin, prepare 2 cups Korean sea salt.
- Toss the Korean sea salt onto the cabbage focusing more salt on the stalk than the leaves (2 cups of salt for 7 lbs of cabbage)
- Arrange cabbage neatly in a large bowl.
- Set aside left-over sea salt water for later use.
- Pour remaining sea salt water over the napa cabbage.
Sweet rice porridge prep:
- Boil 1 cup water for sweet rice porridge
- In another bowl, add 1 cup water.
- Add 3 tbsp sweet rice flour.
- Mix and blend well.
- Once water is boiling, add in the sweet rice flour mixture.
- Keep stirring until it cooks through.
- Set aside to cool.
Kimchi seasoning prep:
- Check the cabbage every 20-30 minutes until cabbage becomes less stiff.
- Peel Korean radish.
- Slice radish into thin pieces and julienne.
- Put in a basin
- Add 1/2 cup of Korean red pepper powder (Gochugaro) and combine it.
- Check cabbage and flip from bottom to top.
- Peel and cut apple and pear in halves, and remove seeds.
- Cut red bell pepper and remove seeds.
- Add bell pepper, 1/2 chopped onion, apple, and pear, sliced 1 tsp ginger, 6 cloves garlic, 2 tbsp Korean shrimp paste, 1/2 cup fish sauce in the blender, and blend.
- Add 1/2 cup Korean red pepper powder into sweet rice porridge and mix well.
- Chop the Chung-ak seaweed, 1 bunch of chives, 6 onion leaves, 1 bunch of water celery, and add to julienned Korean radish.
- Add the blender, and sweet rice porridge mixture, add 1 cup Korean red powder (Gochugaro) and mix well.
- Drain and wash 3 times the soaked napa cabbage in running water.
- Set aside.
- Prepare the blended mixture to 2 tbsp sesame seeds and mix.
- 2 hours have passed, cut the end of the napa cabbage.
- Coat evenly each cabbage leaf with the sauce mixture.
- Form and wrap the cabbage neatly and place it Kimchi box.
- Add sesame seeds as toppings.
- Refrigerate and age, the longer the better and flavourful.
Serve it with rice. Enjoy!
Source: Mama Lee Cooks and Credits: Korean Cooking Group
