The Korean Vegan Cookbook

Last Weekend I was in Chicago (I live a couple hours North of there), and I finally got a copy of Joanne Lee Molinaro’s cookbook The Korean Vegan.

As some of you know from previous posts I have been exploring more vegan eating. I am doing this as a way to eat healthier and expand my food vocabulary. I will never be vegan, but so happy with the new crop of vegan YouTubers. They make vegan delicious and approachable.

One of the first ones I found was Visha Nora of Rainbow Plant Life. In one of her videos she was cooking from the cookbooks of other vegans. That is when I learned about The Korean Vegan Cookbook by Joanne Lee Molinaro and I have been obsessed ever since. I LOVE Korean food! I couldn’t believe I didn’t know about this. TikTok is not my jam, but now I look at it to watch Joanne, though I see a lot of it on YouTube as well. Today and yesterday I made some stuff from the cookbook. Looks like I didn’t do much, but I didn’t get everything done, but I have a lot of the prep work done now.

Spicy Soy Sauce Dressing

Aside from chopping some veggies, one of the easiest things to make. Well a number of things are easy. This is nice and flavorful. I had a hard time finding brown rice syrup, but I finally found it. Or you could use maple syrup. I grew up on the imitation stuff and never took to the real stuff. I didn’t use either. I used sorghum syrup. It can be hard to find, but there is a place in Wisconsin that makes it and I got it at the Winter Farmers Market in Milwaukee WI a few years back. I can also get it at a local store. It has a similar taste and texture to molasses, but I like it better.

Gyerranmari – Korean Style Omelet

This uses an egg replacer called Just Egg. Otherwise like making an omelet, but rolled. I needed half for a recipe, the other half I ate and there is no way you would know it was vegan. Very delicious.

The Korean Vegan Spicy Mayo

This is not in the cookbook, but on her web site. I haven’t used it yet, but I did dip a spoon in it. Guess what? It is very spicy. I accidentally used chili sesame oil instead of regular chili oil. So hard to find chili oil without a ton of crisps and little oil. In the future I will make my own chili oil. So the sesame chili oil I believe affects the taste, but it is still good. I plan on eating fries and maybe blistered shishitos with it. https://thekoreanvegan.com/spicy-vegan-mayo/

Spicy Gochujang Dressing

I needed to make this because it was a part of another recipes. Only change I made was using a roasted garlic mustard that I got at the Mustard Museum in Middleton WI. I am not a mustard fan, but I found some I can tolerate. https://mustardmuseum.com/

Kimchi Bokkeum Bap

Basically Kimchi Fried Rice. I found vegan kimchi at Joong Boo Market in Chicago. I didn’t know we were going to go and I had just got the book, so I wasn’t prepared with a list of other things to buy there, but at least I got vegan kimchi. I also got chive kimchi which isn’t vegan, but for this recipe I used the vegan kimchi. This is the recipe where I used Gyerranmari and the spicy gochujang dressing. I did not make or use the bulgogi recipe, just left it out. It is super delicious and will be my lunch this week at work.

The Book and Upcoming Recipes

Make sure to look for the book, it is well worth it. If you are in Chicago and go to Unabridged Bookstore you might even get a signed copy like I did. Next weekend I am taking a 5 day weekend and hopefully I will make Japchae, Angry Penne Pasta, Jjajangmyun, and Rice Balls. Also in the future Sujebi (spicy turn noodles) and Korean BBQ and Black Bean Burgers. https://www.unabridgedbookstore.com/