An Asian Treat Two Ways

That spread of Korean dishes at the Hunt Library last week got me hungry for a little Korean home cooking. Mine. Now, like a lot of food from Asia, Korean dishes take time to prep and almost no time to cook — you know, dicing, slicing, grating, mixing, then a minute or two in the wok. You’re done.

And, since the recipe for beef in lettuce cups comes from a book titled “Korean Cooking Made Easy,” you could get it on the table in a few, stressless minutes. The recipes in this book are a snap.

One interesting thing about Korean dishes is that beef looks like a favorite ingredient. In three years in China and Indonesia I ate chicken, chicken feet, shrimp, sea cucumber, dog, goat, jelly fish, eel and all kinds of seafood. But beef, not so much. So, if you like beef, Korean cooking features plenty of it. 

Here’s the recipe for beef in lettuce cups and it can be transformed into a wonderful, hearty, Vietnamese/French sandwich called banh mi. 

Marinate one pound of sirloin beef strips in 2 tablespoons of rice wine, and add a dash of  pear juice, if you can find it, or apple cider, and let it sit for 30 minutes.

Then add the beef to a second marinade consisting of 2 teaspoons minced garlic, 1 tablespoon sesame seeds, 2 teaspoons soy sauce, 1 tablespoon of sugar, 2 teaspoons of sesame oil and freshly ground pepper to taste. Let this sit in the refrigerator for 2 to 3 hours.

Stir fry the marinated beef with a dash of peanut oil in a very hot wok until just cooked and arrange in cups of Boston lettuce topped by slices of red onion.

For the Vietnamese banh mi, a delectable sandwich on a French baguette, slice the bread horizontally, cut in sandwich lengths, pick out much of the dough and toast the bread halves lightly.

Then spread with mayonnaise, dot a little Maggi seasoning on each side and place the lettuce cup with beef on the bottom half. Top with pickled shallots, radishes and carrot sticks and add some hot chile peppers, then cilantro leaves and thin slices of cucumber. Put the top piece of baguette on it and dig in. Delicious.