Kimchi Mamas

Kimchi Mamas cook with Kimchi Chronicles

In the interest of full disclosure, after our review of the Kimchi Chronicles TV series in June, Kimchi Mamas bloggers were offered free copies of the Kimchi Chronicles Cookbook by Marja Vongerichten.  Below are reviews from Jomama and Shinyung:

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I was delighted to open up the Kimchi Chronicles by Marja Vongerichten.  The book is heftier than my other 2 Korean cookbooks, and has my favorite features of both.  LOTS of pictures of the finished dishes, and even a couple of before and after.  She also tells stories throughout, beginning with her personal adoption story, and explanations of the context of the dishes and her family life featuring her chef husband and radiant daughter.  Oh, and neighbor Hugh Jackman makes an appearance and a few mentions too!  Even if you had no interest in cooking at all, anyone interested in Korean culture, or adoption, or family life, would enjoy this book for all the narration throughout.

But if you didn't want to cook, or eat, then you'd be missing out.  This is a great collection of recipes!  From traditional Korean dishes, to adapted American style classics.  (Why had I never thought to put kimchi on a hot dog?  I love sauerkraut!  Oooh, I just invented a new recipe: kimchi reuben--thanks for the inspiration, Marja!)  I did find the American cheese a little odd in kimbap, but I can see it in soups as she suggests.

Thanks to all the extra information in each chapter, and every recipe, I learned a lot about Korean culture and cuisine that I never knew.  As a Korean adoptee myself (but without the successful birth mother reunion, chef husband, and movie-star neighbor--other than those little details, we're just the same!), I appreciated her "outsider's" consideration in providing so much background information for those of us who did not grow up in Korean kitchens.  I love that she included recipes for even simple things like sesame oil + salt + pepper.  A native Korean would probably never think of providing that, but I found it very valuable.  I've had this sauce, but wasn't sure what was in it.

On Blogging

About a year ago, I received a call from my mother around 9pm PST.  She lives on the East Coast, so it was around midnight her time.  I picked up the phone, alarmed that something could have happened to my parents who live alone in a closed-blind suburb of New York.

"Mom, is everything ok?" I asked as soon as I answered.

"Are you writing about our family in a blog?" she asked.

I was too stunned to respond.  I had been keeping a blog for the past few years, and I had written liberally about our family.  But I had not told any members of my family about it. 

"Why are you writing about our family?" she continued.  "And why are you doing it in your name?  Other people blog anonymously.  Why do you have to put your full name on your blog?"

Matters of Approval

When we were growing up, there was usually a right and a wrong answer for almost everything.  What is the proper way to read?  Sitting upright with the book held at eye level approximately 1.5 feet away.  What is the right way to sit?  Never with your back hunched over.  What is the right amount of rice to serve?  Always more than just one scoop.  What is the amount of food properly left behind on one's plate?  Certainly never just a morsel or a spoonful.

These answers, fed to us in bite-sized aphorisms, ranged from the mundane to the weighty.  For some of the more serious issues, the questions were never posed because the right answers were presumed to be understood.  For example, our parents never asked us, What kind of a person would you like to marry?  They never asked, Do you wish to marry a white person?  What about someone of Hispanic background?  Or someone black?  We understood that we were to marry a Korean. 

I'm not sure how we first came to that understanding.  Maybe the time when my father consoled his friend whose daughter was dating an Indian.  My dad's friend muttered, "An Indian," as he spit on the ground.  Or the time I told my mom that my Korean-American friend was married to a Japanese woman, and she exclaimed, "How could he do that to his parents!"  I have a vague recollection of my parents taking us aside after these incidents and explaining how Koreans should be married to Koreans. 

In Rejection of Denials

In our family, direct communication is not our forte. 

This is what happened when I asked my parents if they wanted to vacation with us in Hawaii this summer. 

When I called, my dad answered the phone. When I asked him if he wanted to go to Hawaii with us, he told me to ask my mother. 

So I asked my mom. 

"Mom, how about going to Hawaii with us this summer?"

"Oh, this summer may be difficult."

Giving in to Hope

Having a family of my own makes me think about the one I had growing up. My parents, my brother, my sister.  The way we related to each other, or didn't.  The way we treated each other.  Some of the things that went right, but mostly, what didn't. 

I think about my parents when they first started out.  Younger than Jeff and I currently are by almost two decades.  No one starts out intending to have a fractured family, and I'm sure they didn't. I imagine them as a newly married couple as they appear in the wedding photos we have at home -- with years to look forward to, with plans and hopes, and with the same kinds of excitement and anticipation Jeff and I have about raising our own children. Now their oldest child is in his 40s, and the other two, in their late 30s. Do they look back and wonder if things could have turned out differently?

Processing

Ever since I had my baby five months ago, my head's been one big muddle.  The adorable little guy fills me in a way I didn't know was possible and brings out a degree of love and devotion I didn't know I was capable of having.  At the same time, he arrived with a jolt that seemed to knock off balance various delicate pieces of my life that I thought I had put into place over the years.  

Since his arrival, I've been trying to unmuddle myself.  To work through the various reactions I've been having and try to sort them out.  The reactions have ranged from deep feelings of contentment and cloying affection to unshakable anxiety.  Some days have been better than others.  On some days, like today, I feel like I've emerged from that cloud and have happily moved on.  On other days, I'm convinced it's just the hormones.  But when, all of a sudden, I find myself emotional and overwhelmed, with my little brain feeling like it's ready to burst from a slew of endlessly trivial demands, I find myself squeezing my hands against my skull, as if to keep it contained.  Other times, I feel the urge to bang my head, as if to knock out some of the excess junk that clutters the limited space up above.  But then I return to my placid state when all seems perfectly fine, and I wonder what the hell was my problem.

New York Times Article re KA Suicides

Here is an incredibly sad article about suicides among Korean-Americans in the New York area.  It is a reminder about how isolated some individuals and families can be and how so many people may be devastated in this hard economic time.  Please take extra time to reach out to others in your community and support local Korean businesses. 

- Shinyung

The Threat of Domesticity

When I was 14, my parents bought a hamburger stand after my dad quit his company job.  That was when my mom, who had always stayed home and made us after-school snacks, started working full-time for the first time in my life.  They started leaving at 5:30 in the morning and returning after 10pm, six days a week.  That left us three kids to run the household.

I don't remember how much housework we had done before my mom started working.  I remember helping her with the laundry at times and assisting in the kitchen.  And learning how to make a dish here or there.  But I can't recall if we even had regular chores until then.

On Mothering

My parents stayed with us for three weeks to help us take care of our newborn. 

When I first asked her to help us out with our baby, my mom responded, "I think American babies are different than Korean babies."

"What do you mean?"

Vigil

I used to be awakened by the sound. A deep, raspy cough that repeated again and again. As if the lungs were held hostage. But insistent enough to puncture the wall between my parents' bedroom and mine.

In the hollow of the night, I used to lie awake and listen. Captured and paralyzed by it. Quieting my own breathing to listen, even though I didn't want to hear. When all else was silent, it sounded like a rhythm from an Edgar Allan Poe tale. At a time when we were all meant to be asleep, getting our rest after a day's worth of living.

It hadn't always been this way. There used to be a time when we all breathed healthy breaths. When we had slept soundly. When coughs hadn't raise the specter of something more.