A few days ago, I made a new batch of kimchi. It’s been a while since I last fermented cabbage and aromatics (not quite as long ago as this, but probably a year or so). I’m still very much at the novice end of the scale of kimchi mastery, but I’m always happy with my efforts.
This time, I wanted to try a different version – on the back of a conversation with Cath about what would go well with gochujang aubergine, I made a milder kimchi without the gochugaru red chilli powder that I’d normally use, adding lots of fennel, some seaweed, and a small amount of fresh green chilli.
The main fermentation finished last night and the jars were transferred to the fridge. I’ve already eaten kimchi for breakfast. It tastes great. The fennel has a slight toughness to it, but pleasingly so.
As always, I used Felicity Cloake’s recipe as a starting point. For this green kimchi I replaced the daikon and carrot with fennel – cut the stalks off, split the bulb and remove the tough core, then cut into quarter-inch shreds. I added a couple of mild Turkish green chillies cut into rings. I swapped the gochuharu for one and a half deseeded jalapeños which I crushed with the garlic and ginger, plus a dessertspoon of fennel seed, in a pestle and mortar. I added a dessertspoon of dried wakame seaweed and omitted the shrimp and fish sauce. In place of water I used kombu stock – 500ml water, kombu sheets to make up around 6″ by 8″ / 15cm x 20cm / a sheet of A5 paper; soak for 3 to 4 hours. This makes more stock than you need, but you can use the rest in soup – perhaps making a larger batch of stock to facilitate this (see this soup for inspiration); beyond the stated 150ml liquid in the recipe, I needed to add a little extra to the jars to help ensure there was enough liquid to keep the veg submerged while fermenting.
Quite a lot of kimchi recipes use glutinous rice flour cooked in water as part of the spiced paste, which helps it cling to the veg and effectively keep it submerged. The reduced volume of chilli in my green kimchi meant that my paste was thinner and lesser in volume, which is what led to my needing to add more kombu stock. The next time I make this I’ll try the rice flour trick.
I invented this, and then afterwards looked on the internet to see what similar recipes there are already out there. There’s very little that’s new under the sun, as they say – as well as lots of recipes for aubergine with gochujang, this is pretty similar to the Sichuan classic ‘fish fragrant aubergine’ (so-called because the sauce used more often accompanies fish). I used gochujang (Korean hot pepper paste) rather than Sichuan chilli bean paste, and regular aubergines rather than Chinese aubergines (which are not so easy to find here in Leeds, though I have done before now, as in my last blog post).
I’m working on having a healthier diet at the moment – simple changes like eating a bit less, cutting out most refined carbohydrates (white bread, I’m looking at you… Looking at you longingly, while salivating, admittedly, but mostly I’m looking but not touching). Aubergines are known for their ability to drink up all the oil you give them, so can easily become a heavy dish; salting or brining them helps make them less absorbent of oil – and shallow-frying in a little oil rather than deep-frying (which would be the traditional way in the Sichuan recipe) means they can’t become oil-saturated; a non-stick pan will be your friend here. The biggest impact on the healthiness of your meal will then be what you choose to serve with the aubergines – I’d suggest brown rice, smashed cucumber salad (which will feature in future post, though it’s also one that you can find many recipes for online), and maybe a light stir-fry of crisp veg to contrast with the soft silken aubergine. The recipe below will serve four or more people with these accompaniments, so the amount of oil each person has is fairly low. It’s not out-and-out low fat – but every little helps and all that.
It used to be the case that aubergines needed salting to draw out bitterness, but the standard aubergines you can easily find don’t particularly need this these days – other varieties of aubergine may benefit more.
If you don’t have gochujang – buy some! I get mine from the Chinese supermarket, and I’ve found decent stuff in Morrisons here in Leeds. Otherwise, you could invent an alternative by using miso paste, or soy sauce, or even by using stock instead of water; and chilli sauce, chilli paste or chilli powder. The Chingkiang black vinegar could be replaced with another vinegar (eg. balsamic or cider vinegar). The sauce should taste a little bit too salty on its own, with a chilli heat that you like. Have some soy sauce and chilli available for people to tweak things to their preference. Optionally, you could season the cornflour with a teaspoon of Chinese five spice and/or some ground Sichuan peppercorns.
3 dessertspoons of salt
2 aubergines
1 very heaped dessertspoon of gochujang
2 dessertspoons soy sauce
1 dessertspoon sugar or honey
2 dessertspoons Chinkiang vinegar
3 rounded dessertspoons of cornflour
4 dessertspoons of oil plus a small splash more
5 or 6 cloves of garlic
3 large very mild green chillies (I get ones labelled as Turkish chillies, from the market) – or substitute with a green pepper
4 spring onions
Mix the salt in a large bowl with a litre or so of cold water.
Wash the aubergines and remove the green stalk caps. Cut them across the body into two or three round sections, then split each section into eight wedges or into half-inch thick batons. Put these in the bowl of brine. Add more water as needed to cover the aubergines – they’ll float, so they won’t be fully submerged on their own. Weight the aubergines down with a plate to hold them under the water. Leave to soak for 30 minutes (up to an hour or two will be fine). Make a sauce by mixing the gochujang, soy sauce, sugar/honey and vinegar with 350ml of cold water.
After they have soaked in the brine, drain the aubergines, pressing them slightly to squeeze a little more water out. Put them in a dry bowl. Put half of the cornflour onto the aubergines, mix roughly, then put the other half over and mix again. You won’t get the aubergines pieces completely evenly coated, and there will be moist cornflour stuck to the bowl, but don’t worry.
Put a wide, flat non-stick frying pan or skillet over a medium high heat – something big enough to hold half of the aubergine pieces in a single layer. Add a dessertspoon of oil, and when that is heated add half of the aubergine pieces, with a cut side on the base of the pan rather than the skin, in a single layer. Give the pan a gentle swirl to help distribute the oil. Fry for three or four minutes until the undersides of the aubergine pieces are starting to brown, then turn them. Pour another dessertspoon of oil in amongst the aubergine pieces and gently swirl to distribute the oil. After another three or four minutes, transfer the aubergine pieces to a plate or bowl lined with kitchen paper to absorb excess oil, and repeat the process with the remaining aubergine pieces. (Alternatively, have two pans on the go at once.)
While the aubergines are cooking, peel and chop the garlic – it doesn’t need to be too thinly cut. Slice the chillies or green pepper into bite-size chunks, discarding the seeds. Slice the whites of the spring onions on an angle into 2cm sections. Thinly slice the spring onion greens and set aside.
Once you have cooked both batches of aubergine, wipe the pan out with a piece of kitchen paper to remove any excess bits of cornflour (taking care not to burn yourself, naturally). Add a small splash of oil to the pan, followed by the garlic, peppers and spring onion whites. Stir fry for a couple of minutes until the garlic is starting to brown – take care that it doesn’t burn. Add the aubergine pieces, mix gently so everything is in a single layer. Pour over the sauce, trying to get some on every piece of aubergine. Cook for 5 or 6 minutes – you may need to turn the heat down further and/or add a splash of hot water part-way through if the sauce is getting too dry, though you do want it to reduce and thicken. It can tend to stick a little on the bottom of the pan as it thickens, so take care that it doesn’t burn.
Test a piece of aubergine to see if it is cooked to your liking. (I think it should be very soft, because an undercooked aubergine is a miserable thing.) Cook for a little longer if needed, with a splash more water if the sauce is getting very thick, and tweak the amount of soy sauce and/or vinegar to taste. You can also leave the aubergines ticking over on a very low heat for a few minutes while you prepare other dishes.
Sprinkle the spring onion greens over the top, and serve.
Spoilt Broth 