7 Banchan Dishes in Korean Cuisine

Banchan is a collection of Korean side dishes that dinner guests enjoy in Korea and around the world as a prelude to the main meal. Examples of banchan dishes include pickled radishes, scallion pancakes, and fermented cabbage, to name just a few. Cooks might serve these small side dishes before treating guests to rice dishes like bibimbap or with Korean BBQ dishes like bulgogi. Although banchan typically arrive at the table before the main dish, in Korean culinary culture they are not appetizers but instead complementary to the meal. Some restaurants label banchan as condiments.

Banchan dishes, or side dishes, accompany Korean meals prepared by home chefs and Korean restaurants alike. If you want to try making banchan at home, visit an Asian or Korean grocery store to buy the ingredients you will need, such as zucchini, cucumbers, soybean sprouts, soybean paste, sesame seeds, and even dipping sauces. Here are several types of banchan dishes you can consider making at home:

1. 1. Bokkeum: A term that describes a cooking method as well as a food, bokkeum is a name for a stir-fried dish in a sauce. An example is jeyook bokkeum, which is pork that a cook prepares in a sauce from gochujang, a chili pepper paste.
2. 2. Jangajji: In Korean cuisine, non-fermented pickled vegetables are jangajji. Common jangajji include garlic scapes, perilla leaves, radish, and cucumber, which cooks often season with soy sauce.
3. 3. Jeon: Pan-fried pancakes are jeon. Two examples include pajeon, which are scallion pancakes, and kimchijeon, which are kimchi pancakes.
4. 4. Jjim: Another name for steamed dishes is jjim—for example, saengseon jjim, which is steamed fish.
5. 5. Jorim: Korean foods that simmer in a seasoned broth are jorim. One example is dubu-jorim, which consists of tofu that simmers in a soy sauce mixture with garlic and green onions.
6. 6. Kimchi: The term “kimchi” typically refers to spicy baechu kimchi—fermented napa cabbage with sea salt, gochugaru, garlic, ginger, and jeot. There are many other kinds of kimchi, including radish kimchi (such as kkakdugi, which uses white radish), cucumber kimchi, non-spicy white kimchi, and scallion kimchi (such as pa kimchi, which contains scallions and salted anchovies). You can find jars of kimchi at a Korean grocery store, but it’s easy to make kimchi at home.
7. 7. Namul: Steamed, blanched, or sautéed vegetables with a seasoning of sesame oil, garlic, vinegar, and soy sauce are namul. Common namul include dishes like kongnamul (blanched bean sprouts), miyeok muchim (seaweed with salt and sweet vinegar), and musaengchae (white radish in a sweet vinegar sauce and ground chili peppers). Further examples are sigeumchi namul (parboiled spinach with garlic, soy sauce, and sesame oil), gaji namul (boiled eggplant), and gogumasun namul (boiled sweet potato shoots).

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