Easy Korean BBQ

Earlier I made Korean spare ribs on the BBQ. Now we do it a little differently; I already cut the meat into strips so that everything gets crispy and the marinade can absorb well. Then we roll the strips in a leaf of butter lettuce with some sushi rice and a fresh salad of white cabbage (Coleslaw). This is my take on easy Korean BBQ.

This recipe is enough for 5 people.

Ingredients

• 500 grams chicken thighs
• 1 sirloin steak
• Pork belly – 5 pieces (thin)

Marinade

• 1 pear
• 1 lemon
• 5 cm ginger
• 1 large onion
• 2 tsp gochujang – Korean chilli paste
• 4 cloves of garlic
• 5 tablespoon of salty sweet soy sauce (I use the less salty version from Kikkoman)
• 5 teaspoons of sesame oil
• 1 tablespoon of sugar

• Large head of butter lettuce
• Hoisin sauce (if you want to make it at home, check this link)
• Sushi rice
• Sesame seeds as topping

1. Cook sushi rice for 4-5 people
2. Grind onion, garlic, sugar and ginger (in pieces) well in a mortar or food processor or immersion blender.
3. Add the pear (crushed), the sweet soy sauce, sesame oil, chilli paste and the squeezed lemon and stir well.
4. Cut all the meat into strips (you can use siccours like the Koreans do)
5. Divide the marinade between three bowls and pour in the marinade and mix well.
6. Let it sit for half an hour (approximately).
7. In the meantime, light the BBQ.
8. Roast the meat (make sure the slices are not too wet – just dab with kitchen paper).
9. Roll the meat in lettuce leaf together with some rice and dip in, for example, hoisin sauce.

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Koreans love to roll there food in lettuce or seaweed leaves. I add in thus recipe also some sushi rice to roll together with the meat. You can dip this in, for example, hoisin sauce, but a miso mayonnaise (1 teaspoon of miso with 2 tablespoons of mayo) is also great with it.

If you don’t have a food processor or hand blender at hand, a mortar or Indonesian cobek works perfect as well. The marinade smells so good. Especially the sesame oil and the chilli paste make it Korean right away.

The meat has marinated for about half an hour. I scoop the strips onto plates and use a kitchen towel so they aren’t too wet before they go on the BBQ.

I think it’s nice to use three types of meat, because the marinade always tastes slightly different with different meats. The pork belly slices become crispy easily because they are cut into strips. The sirloin steak is a completely different kind of meat from a different animal (cow) and it is important that it remains juicy inside. So do not roast it too long.

We slowly sear the meat and lower the grill a bit each time, so that the pear and the sugars in the marinade caramelize a bit. I add some courgette (sukini) too.

Then we have ready on the table: freshly cooked sushi rice (I just make that in my electric rice steamer); homemade hoisin sauce; a miso mayonnaise (mix 1 teaspoon of miso with 2 tablespoons of mayo) and butter lettuce leaves.

This time I also made a coleslaw; a white cabbage salad with a sauce of mayonnaise, mustard and sugar. A scoop of this is also delicious with the meat in a leaf of lettuce.

Roll some rice, a strip of meat and some salad into a piece of lettuce and dip this in to a sauce. Eat this easy Korean BBQ recipe in two bites :-).