Wisdom #8

"I have finished this book in April 1962, in the tenth month of my sabbatical year. The earth looks good from my window: the last protective brown leaves are falling from the oak and little yellow-green ones start from the twigs and branches of the willow; the Japanese quince is fully of tiny leaves, and the tinier buds of the quince blossoms are already pink among them. The peach tree that my wife planted from a pit is ten feet high this spring, and the dogweed is grey with a foam of new buds. It seems scarcely possible that the world should be in the state I describe in this book."

Jules Henry, Culture Against Man, Preface

A Truely Gruling Day; A Truely Splended Eve

Arrive at 6 on the dot to Honorable Elder Brother on the phone in the workshop talking about tractors and Honorable Elder Sister cooking dinner and ushering me in to a hot bath. Oh yes. There are two large bowls (I'm talking 1-foot diameter) of figs, just picked off the tree in the front yard. They are waiting for me to be clean.

Dinner is on the table when I get out of the bath. A hefty serving of rice along with sweet potato noodles (seasoned with sesame oil topped with seaweed) and some old, sour, rinsed, fantastic kimchi on the side. Also, bowls of Sesame Leaf Kimchi and another watery kimchi made of onions and some other leafy green. Also, a humble offering of candied peanuts, which I bought from the organic shop, de-shelled, and then made myself. Two bowls of Farmer's rice wine, which tastes all the better after 7.5 hours on a bicycle. We have a nice chat over dinner about this and that - their gardens, the seeds I gave them, the chicken coop I helped H.E.B. work on, my garden, Basil. H.E.S. says "Wow, it's been such a long time since we ate with Mike, I kind of want to get drunk." For dessert, fresh figs galore. For immediately post-dessert dessert, some sweet roasted sweet potatoes.

Then H.E.S., who is a nurse during the day, prepares some boiling hot water, soaks some towels, rubs some mint jelly stuff on my legs, and gives me a thigh massage. She tells me that 141km is probably too far to ride my bicycle in a day and that maybe tomorrow I should consider just lazing around the house all day. I may just take her up on that. She shows me how to control the electric blanket on the bed and turns it up to 5 out of 7. She sends me to bed. I tell her to wake me up in the morning, that I feel like I should at least say goodbye after receiving such excellent hospitality. She tells me not to be ridiculous, that I can say goodbye next time I come.

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Events leading up to the above:

7:00 Wake up, pack, eat a monster breakfast consisting of all the leftovers in my fridge. Potatoes, "deo-deok" roots, hot peppers, dipping paste, lotus roots.
8:35 Depart.
9:35 First 20k done. Good pace.
10:35 2nd 20k done. Good pace.

(Somewhere in between 9:35 and 10:35 I notice that there are persimmon trees all around and that some of the branches are hanging over the road. It occurs to me that I could nab one without even stopping. I grab one off a tree, separate it from the branch and leaves that came with it, and start to much, all while zipping along. Unfortunately, it's rather astringent [a trendy nickname for Persimmons these days is "astringency"] and I wonder whether it's just not quite ripe or whether it's got pesticide all over it. I get all worked up and have to stop, not sure whether or not I'll vomit. Punishment 1. Later, I'm looking at the Persimmon, thinking about the Golden Rule, and wondering if, if I had a farm, I'd be upset if a biker grabbed one of my fruits for sustenance on his trip. I fail to notice a speedbump and almost wipe out. Punishment 2. Then, When I'm done, I chuck the inedible part off to the side of the road. The motion dislodges but doesn't quite knock off my left pannier bag; had it fallen off, I might have gone down with it. Punishment 3.)

10:44 First rest stop at a little bus stand. It's got a large plastic persimmon on top. Snack on some tangerines and almonds.
11:45 60 Km down. Pace is still god - looks like it'll be a short trip. Entering the next province. Have a lie-down on the side of the road under some flags and chestnut trees. Snack a little more, then move on.
12:00 All of a sudden, town with some restaurants. Settle on spicy tofu soup. Rice, soup, 6 side dishes, water bottle refill: less than 5 bucks. Also, 20 minute nap on the grass in the restaurant's front yard.
1:00 Recommence.
3:00 100 kilos. Speed is a little lower. The whole trip is supposed to be 107 or 114, but according to the signs I'm still 30-odd kilos out. A little nervous. But only a little.
Until 6:00 3 hours to finish the last 40 kilos. I stop about 10 times to ask directions, and stop several more to push my bike up hills. Rule of thumb: Walking speed is 5.5 km/h. If the terrain is steep enough that you can't ride at twice that speed, it's not worth it. Consider giving up and asking the farmer to come pick me up somewhere, but I eventually find some flat ground and my 2nd (or 10th) wind. I can see their house from across the river...just gotta find the bridge. Hark!

R(eally) I(ncr(edibly)) C(lean and) E(asy)

That's right, that monstrosity up there is an acronym. AAFR. An Acronym for Rice.

I have been here for four years, and, as far as I can remember (a blog search confirms this), have not written a post about rice. Over the years I have shared my experiences with Kimchi and Bulgogi, lotus and pheasant, pancakes and octopodes. And yet not once have I devoted a post explicitly to the little grainy guy that that makes a meal a meal and not just some random collection of sides with nothing to tie them together.

There are reasons for said dearth. First of all, white rice is boring. Not particularly tasty, not particularly beautiful, not particularly healthy. Second, it's everywhere. The only way to avoid it at a restaurant is to eat noodles, which may or may not be made of rice powder. Third, because of reasons 1 and 2, I don't usually cook it at home. Fourth, I was never very good at cooking it.

[There is a good reason for said inability to cook. When I first arrived, one of my coworkers gave me a rice-cooker that had been sitting around her house for years. It was a fairly low-quality device, with a burnt-out light and leaky steam catcher. It always burned rice to the bottom of the pan and dribble sludge onto the counter. Even though I kept spreadsheets detailing the ratios of rice to water and the cooking duration and all that, I could never quite get it right; matter over mind, I suppose. But, already possessing a (somewhat) (dys)functional rice cooker, I couldn't convince myself to buy another. This left me to choose between cooking rice and burning a third of it, cooking it in a pot when I already had a cooker, or just not bothering.]

That is, until now! In addition to teaching me how to use chopsticks, speak Korean, and deny myself pleasures in the name of the greater good*,**, I can now say that my time in the East has granted me some substantial rice-cooking skills.

I hereby impart them to you.

What to cook:

1) Mixed-grain rice (the more mixed, the better. I've seen 5, 7, 11, 14, 17, 25, and maybe 29-grain varieties. The 14-grain I used today includes sorghum, glutinous brown rice, barley, glutinous millet, corn, glutinous rice, brown rice, black rice, millet, split green peas and black beans, and 3 other legumes I can't translate ). Add about 1.5 times as much water by volume. Salt a little, if you like.

{{PARDON THE INTERRUPTION BUT: MY INDIAN NEIGHBOR JUST CAME OVER UNANNOUNCED (BUT NOT UNWELCOMED) WITH A DISH OF TAMIL-STYLE CHICKPEAS COOKED WITH CURRY LEAVES AND CUMIN AND COCONUT AND IS IN FACT ONE HECK OF AN UPSTANDING GENT. THIS IS WHY IT PAYS TO LEAVE YOUR FRONT DOOR OPEN.}}

2) Get crazy! Chop up a little sweet potato or sweet pumpkin and toss it in! Unapologetically strew about some pea- or chest-nuts. Even some (shelled) sunflower or pumpkin seeds. Add a little more water if you dump in a lot of extras.

How not to cook it:

3) Many people go for what I like to call the "rice and water in a pot over heat" method. While time-tested and fairly simple, this method generally requires a fair amount of caution and attention, and even so, is likely to result in some inedible rice and unpleasant cleaning experiences. The more varieties of rice and beans you're cooking, the truer this is.

4) You may be tempted to use a pressure cooker to cook the rice faster. Good idea. Also, good luck. It's very hard not to scorch the bottom layer of rice. Furthermore, the steam often pulls off bean skins and rice hulls, lifting them straight up into the vent that you're supposed to use to release the steam. This screws with the pressure regulation and makes the process less predictable.

How to cook it:

5) Thus, after some advice from a NASA PhD acquaintance of mine*** and some experimentation on my own, I developed my own method. Put the rice concoction and concomitant water into a metal or ceramic bowl with tight-fitting lid. Put the lidded bowl (yes, the whole thing, not just the contents) on a steamer tray. Set the steamer tray inside a pressure-cooker with about an inch of water - just enough to get close to the steamer tray.

6) Boil for 15 or 20 or 25 minutes, depending on how much rice and what kinds. Turn off the heat and wait 5 or 10 more minutes. The temperature will drop and the pressure will decrease, so that when you finally knock the valve open,

Benefits of aforeimparted method:

- Because the transfer of heat from fire to rice is so mediated, there's no chance of burning anything. The method is therefore anticarcinogenic.

- Thus, no need for stirring or pacing. You can go watch a 20-minute TED talk while the rice is on. Worry about the state of the world, not about the state of your grub.

- No burning means no soaking scrubbing and scraping and scratching of pots.

- Also, the mediated heat transfer reduces the havoc of flying bean and rice skins. Plus, everything that does go a-flying is stopped by the lid of the cooking bowl, which, lacking slats and vents and all, is much easier to clean than the lid of the prsesure cooker.

- Because you're using a pressure cooker, it's quick. I suppose this saves on gas, too.

- And perhaps my favorite part: when you transfer the rice from the cooking bowl to your serving bowls, there may be a little bit of scuzz left over. If you wait to clean it, it may dry on and become a slight nuisance. HOWEVER, why don't you just pour the remaining, nearly-scalding-hot water from the bottom of the pressure cooker into the cooking bowl?! It will melt away the scuzz and cool off by the time you're ready to do the dishes. This is really great because you don't need to use as much new water to rinse the dishes, nor do you have to throw away all that precious gas-turned-heat energy that's stored in the water. THREE CHEERS FOR THE EFFICIENT USE OF RESOURCES.

Results:

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*I think I was naturally good at this, though. Korea can't take all the credit.
**There may be (OK, there most certainly are) other contributing psychological issues as well. I know all about 'em, believe you me.
*** AKA Jeffrey A. "If there's anyone in the world who can subsist on only rice cakes and cheddar cheese spread, it's probably this guy" Hinkley.

당신이곧부처임니다

The more you (I) think about it, the less useful our vernacular terminology for classifying plants becomes. Everyone has had an argument at some point about the fruit-ness or vegetable-hood of cucumbers and tomatoes. What's the defining characteristic? Growing on trees? The seeds? The sweetness? Being able to eat them raw?

And why are peanuts, which grow underground, and chestnuts, which fall off of trees inside little spiny balls, both "nuts"? We all have been told that peanuts are legumes, but what do they have in common with peas? And how are a peas different from green beans? Which part of the green bean is the bean? And, most importantly, what in God's good name is a cashew, which looks like a tree-gourd turd?

What's the difference between a sesame seed and a grain of corn and a pine nut?

Does anyone else think of Ginko as an herb? Did you know Ginko nuts fall off Ginko trees exactly like acorns from oaks? Why did I capitalize "Ginko" but not "oak"?

Carrots are vegetables, we all agree, but what about potatoes? Aren't they just starches? Ginger is doubtless a spice. Why am I uncomfortable calling 더덕 (Codonopsis lanceolata) and 도라지 (Platycodon grandiflorum) vegetables, when they need to be dug up from underground just the same as carrots?

All of this is my way of saying that I have no idea what category Lotus Root fits into. How about I shut up and show you how to turn the light, crisp unclassifiable root flesh into a sweet, oily, candied side dish?

1) Head to "Lightning Market" by the train station, buy a basket of these suckers for less than two dollars, and assure the grandma that even though you're white you know exactly what to do.

2) Rinse off all the dirt.


3) Peel and slice.


4) Boil for a bit in water with a little bit of vinegar. Drain, then fry for a minute in sesame oil. Then add soy sauce, rice syrup (the traditional Korean equivalent of honey or corn syrup), and brown sugar.


5) Sprinkle with roasted sesame seeds and serve as a side, preferably on a dish you made on 7 March 2010.

*Admission: Real lotus root side dishes come out with a thick, sweet gravy. Really candied. I guess I didn't throw in enough sugar and syrup. But I'd like to pretend that they came out like this because I wanted a healthier variety.

**While researching this post, I learned the rather unsurprising fact, which I assume I already knew implicitly, that, actually, all plants have roots, stems, leaves, flowers, fruits, and seeds. All nuts, cereals, seeds and beans/legumes are apparently varieties of "Seed". I suppose that things that we call "fruit" generally belong to the "Fruit" category, and that things which we call vegetables could belong to just about any category other than "Seed." Our layman's terminology is largely based on synechdoche. When we say "this is a cucumber," we mean "this is the fruit of the cucumber plant," and when we say "this is a potato," we mean "this is the root of a potato plant." And yet, we can't call a sunflower seed by the name "sunflower."

***Interestingly, in Korea, where they sometimes eat multiple parts of the same plant, one part gets priority. For instance, much as in English, the word for "sweet potato" refers to the root, and you need to add the word "stem" if you want to talk about the awesome stir-fried sweet potato stem side dish that I tried for the first time a few weeks ago. "Pumpkin" refers to the big orange or green thing, and you need to add another word to talk about pumpkin seeds or pumpkin leaves. But couldn't the word "pumpkin" just as easily refer to the leaf, in the same way that "lettuce" does, so that you'd have to buy some "pumpkin fruit" or "pumpkin gourd" if you wanted to make a pie? This may or may not raise some interesting issues in the philosophy of nomenclature. I hope they keep you up at night.

COLD BEAN NOODLES YEAHHHHHHH

Here's a recipe for one of my favorite Korean foods, 콩국수, ie Kong guksu, ie cold noodles in a broth made of boiled, dried, and powdered beans.

1) Obtain bean powder from middle-aged lady friend's mother who lives in the countryside and is in her 60s but still runs an organic farm and makes her own kimchi etc. Place in bowl.

2) Add water slowly until broth reaches desired consistency. Not too much, as the nutty taste is paramount. Then boil noodles, drain, and rinse under cold water.

3) Add in your choice of fresh or cooked vegetables. Boiled green pumpkin, steam sweet pumpkin, cucumber spears and sliced tomatoes all work well. Also, some ice. This is, after all, a seasonal dish, a summer specialty.

4) For some extra fat and protein, drop in some peanuts. Crush, if you're so inclined.

5) To counter the rich and fatty flavor of beans, nuts, and noodles, a nice side of cool vegetables (cucumbers, cucumber-peppers [not very spicy, but crisp and tasty), and carrots are all good choices) and a salty dipping sauce made of soybean paste, red pepper paste, minced garlic, sesame oil, and perahps a drop of soysauce.

Then take a nap.