Etymology Lesson:
Bulgogi is a compound word of bul (fire, 불) and gogi (meat, ê³ ê¸°). It litterally translates to "fire-meat".
Ingredients:
6 tablespoons light soy sauce (light soy sauce is a little different than the Chinese/Japanese soy sauce most Americans are used too, but "regular" soy sauce can be substituted.)
2 tablespoons soju (soju is Korean unrefind rice wine, substitute sake if you can't find soju)
2 tablespoons honey
4 cloves of garlic
1-2 tablespoons ginger
1 tablespoon red pepper paste (flakes)
1 green onion
1 asian pear
1/2 pound thinly sliced ribeye or sirloin (about twice the thinkness of a deli cold cut)
1 head of napa cabbage
1-2 cups of rice (precooking)
pickled garlic cloves (regular can be substituted)
red pepper paste
kimchi
green onion
Directions:
Chop the green onion, ginger and smash/chop the garlic cloves. Puree the asian pear. Mix everything listed above the beef in the ingredient list together. Add the beef and marinate for 1 hour to 1.5 hours. While marinating the beef wash the napa cabbage and chop off the tops of the leaves (think about the size of a slice of bread), save the leaves and discard the core. Cook the rice until it is cooked and sticky. Chop the kimchi into pieces, dice the remaining green onion. On a very hot grill on grill pan cook the marinated beef until medium rare to rare (this happens very quickly, about 1-2 minutes per side due to the thinness of the beef).
To Serve:
Take a napa cabbage leaf, place in rice, beef, red pepper paste, kimchi, garlic, and green onion. Wrap up like an egg roll/small burrito. Enjoy!
Notes:
1: This is a serving for two people, adjust amounts accordingly for more people.
2: If you don't like hot (spicy) food leave out the red pepper paste.
3: This dish can also be made with pork (Dwaeji gogi ë¼ì§€ ê³ ê¸°) or chicken (Dak gogi ë‹ ê³ ê¸°). Everything is the same except the meat, and cooking times will be a little different due to how fast the meat cooks (and chicken should be well done but medium rare pork is safe now that pigs are better fed). Koreans usually like thigh meat for dak gogi and the chicken is usually not as thinly sliced so it does take longer to cook.
4: What are you going to do with the rest of the 12 oz. soju bottle? Simple, Soju Bombs! 1-2 oz of soju + 1 12 oz. beer (light to medium lager/ale).