Sunday Feast № 29 | Korean Soybean Paste Soup

This is a simple story I am prone to have. After a discussion about miso soup, I ventured to procure miso paste. Now a sane person would probably pay more attention to the fact that they are in a Korean supermarket and Korean delicacies are more than likely to occupy shelf space. I grabbed a box of soybean paste not paying attention that doenjang is not the same as miso paste. The preparation process differs and so does the taste spectrum, so I read. What to do with doenjang then, I asked myself?    PBS Food website features a warming and light yet nourishing soup from Cathlyn’s Korean Kitchen that I altered by not using enoki mushrooms but upping the amount of shiitake and ground beef, using ichimi togarashi still curiously left from when I made Japanese-style Squid/Seafood Salad, and using a simple konbu and soy sauce broth instead of anchovy seakelp one. Apologies for straying into Japanese, but happily a mistake turned into a new favorite that hugs the belly just right.

4 oz beef 2 tbsp Korean soybean paste (doenjang) 1 tsp Korean chili flakes or ichimi togarashi ½ tsp sesame oil 1 tbsp garlic minced 4 cups of seaweed broth + 2 cups water 1 potato cut into 1-in cubes ½ onion thinly sliced 12 oz firm tofu cut into 1-in cubes ½ medium zucchini cut into 1-in cubes 4 fresh shiitake mushrooms thinly sliced 1 chili pepper thinly sliced 1 green onion sliced

Heat a lightly oiled small pot. Sauté the ground beef with soybean paste, chili pepper flakes or ichimi togarashi, sesame oil and garlic over medium heat for 3-4 min. Add broth and water and stir well to dissolve the soybean mixture. Add potato. Cover and boil over medium heat for 5-10 min. Add the onion, tofu, zucchini, mushrooms and chili pepper. Boil for additional 5-7 min. Sprinkle green onions on top before serving.