I would not consider myself a top chef. My skills are maybe above average but way below a Michelin star. The boyfriend likes my food so at least I have that going for me. I have always just added flavors as I cooked, or pulled a recipe that sounded delicious from Pinterest. Sometimes I get inspired by other things though.
Recently, our weekend date night has been to watch a Netflix show and cook together. The inspiration for the cooking has came from the show itself. We have been watching Bon Appetit, Your Majesty- a Korean drama show. The leading character who is a chef, travels back in time and ends up being the chef for a Tyrant king in the Josean era Korea. I wont say much more but she creates good dishes for the king and runs into political and heart trouble.
My take away here, is that I have been making similar dishes to the ones that she creates for the King. Seeing all the food cooked and then characters over the top reactions to the flavor got me wanting to try some. I have been to plenty of Korean restaurants, but have never really cooked any Korean food. So I looked up popular Korean dishes. This article had some good ones in it.
The picture above is my latest. I followed a recipe (loosely) for this Tteokbokki-Style Gnocchi. I added chicken for protein, chili powder for more of a kick and cashews for a bit of crunch. I have found that I really like Gochujang, which is Korean Chili Paste. I also made a really delicious Gochujang soup with tofu and diakon radishes. The broth was so good and I had just the right mix of ingredients. To my big surprise, the BF said that the soup was the best thing that I have made for him in 3 years. He also said that my Gnocchi was on point!
I dont want to toot my own horn. I couldnt get enough of the dishes and the flavor. Boyfriend only had compliments, the biggest of which was finishing of the whole pot. I did not know that I was a Korean Chef in a previous life 🙂 Surprising but I will take the win!!
The Distracted Damsel 