Gimbap
….It’s something that my mom used to make for me for my school picnic. Whenever the picnic was announced, the first thing to come into my mind was this delicious gimbap. On that day everyone brings gimbap from home, shares a bite with their friends, and tries to figure out which gimbap tastes better. we sat on the grass on the side of the mountain and shared our gimbap and other snacks like sweet candy, boiled eggs with salt, and sprite. Great times! What a touching story! Basically, gimbap is seaweed rice roll made of gim(a sheet of dried seaweed) and bap(rice). My husband JOHN loves egg gimbap instead of gim, so I made gimbap a little different for him. For fillings, you can replace spinach with salted cucumber sticks, carrots with crab sticks, and beef with ham. Spring has come! It’s time for us to make something delicious, pack a lunch box, and go on a picnic.
Servings: 2–3: 5 rolls
Time: 1 hour 30 minutes
Ingredients:
- 3 sheets of seaweed paper(gim)
- 4–5 cup steamed rice
- 1 cup beef, sliced
- 1 1/2 cup carrot, sliced
- 5 strips of yellow pickled radish
- 1/2 lb spinach namul(this is optional)
- 2 cup gobo jorim(braised burdock root)(this is optional)
- 8–9 eggs
- sea salt to taste
- 2 ts sugar
- black pepper to taste
- 1/2 Ts Mirin
- 1/2 Ts plume extract
- 1 Ts soy sauce
- 2 ts toasted sesame seeds
- 2 ts sesame oil
- 1/2 Ts garlic, minced
- 1/2 Ts green onion, minced
- 5 Ts avocado oil
Cooking Instructions:
- Marinade the beef, sugar, black pepper, Mirin, plum extract, soy sauce, toasted sesame seeds, sesame oil, garlic, and green onion into a bowl and mix well evenly. Set aside.
2. Heat a pan with medium high heat and add 1 Ts avocado oil, the carrot into the pan to stir them for 1 minute. Set aside.
3. Crack the eggs in a bowl and add 3/4 ts sea salt. Beat it with an egg whisk and remove the stringy chalaza. Heat a pan with medium low heat and drizzle a few drops of oil into the pan. Wipe off the excess with a paper towel so only a thin sheen of oil remains.
4. Turn down the heat to low heat and pour the egg mixture into the pan. Spread it into a large square so it fills the pan(make 2 egg large square).
5. When the bottom of the egg is cooked, flip it over with a long stick. Remove from the heat and let it cook slowly in the hot pan for 5 minutes, with the ultimate goal of keeping the egg as yellow as possible, and not brown. Set aside.
6. Make a rolled omelette, pour about 1/3 of the egg mixture on the pan and spread it thinly by tilting the pan. When it’s cooked, lift the right side edge of the omelette and roll it with a spatula from right to left. Repeat this of 4 and 5 until the egg mixture runs out. When the omelette cools down, cut to length. Set aside.
7. Heat a pan with medium high heat and add 1 Ts avocado oil and marinated beef to stir fry them for 2–3 minutes. Set aside.
8. Make the gobo jorim, spinach namul(these are optional). Place all of the fillings on the sheet tray.
9. Heat a pan with medium heat and add 3 Ts avocado oil, steamed rice, and sea salt to stir fry them for 1–2 minutes until when the oil is absorbed into the rice. Set aside for cooling down.
10. Place an egg square on a bamboo mat with a plastic food wrap. Evenly spread about 3/4 cup of cooked rice over top of it, leaving about 2 inches uncovered on one side of the egg square.
11. Place beef, carrot, yellow pickled radish strip, gobo jorim, and spinach namul in the center of the rice.
12. Use both hands to roll the mat(along with egg and rice) over the fillings very carefully, so one edge of the rice and egg reaches the opposite edge. This centers the fillings in the roll, so they’ll be nicely in the middle when you slice it. Remove the roll from the mat at the end and set the finished roll aside with the seam down to seal it nicely.
13. Place a sheet of gim on a bamboo mat with the shiny side down. Evenly spread about 3/4 cup of cooked rice over top of it, leaving about 2 inches uncovered on one side of the gim.
14. Place beef, carrot, yellow pickled radish strip, egg strip, gobo jorim, and spinach namul in the center of the rice.
15. It should be the same as egg gimbap. Grab the mat with both hands and press it tightly as you continue rolling the gimbap. Push out the mat as you roll, so it doesn’t get wrapped in the gimbap. Repeat 2 more times with the remaining ingredients.
16. Cut each roll into 1/4 inch bite size pieces with a sharp knife, occasionally wiping it with a wet paper towel or cloth to clean the starch off and to ease cutting. Put it on a plate and serve immediately or pack it in a lunchbox.
You can also view this recipe on instagram.
