As with all types of hotpot, the broth is important. But making beef broth for beef jeongol is a big commitment – you need hours (and a very large pot) to simmer bones and other ingredients. If you have the time, by all means make your own beef broth, but if you don’t, that’s OK.
Korean markets sell all types of packaged beef broth: granules (which I find one-dimensional), concentrates that come in little plastic packets ready to be diluted, and my favourite, ready-to-use packets of seasoned broth.
Whichever type you use, it’s good to simmer the broth with a few extra ingredients. If possible, use soup soy sauce to season the broth; it’s pale in colour but has a strong umami flavour. Regular soy sauce, even light soy sauce, will turn the broth a muddy brown.
Because most of the ingredients are cooked at once, you need a fairly large pot: for three to four people, use a wide, shallow pot that holds two litres to 2.5 litres. If the ingredients don’t all fit into the pot together, it is fine to cook half of them and add the remainder when there is space.
Towards the end of the meal, after cooking most of the ingredients, I like to add more boiling broth (or plain water) to the pot and simmer noodles and/or frozen mandu (Korean dumplings), to eat with the soup.
I usually make my own marinade for the beef, but you can also buy bottled bulgogi marinade. The commercial marinade is saltier and sweeter than the home-made version.
If you are serving this to big meat lovers, you might want to double the amount of beef and marinade. Put half of the beef in the pot for the initial cooking, then add the remainder after the first portion has been eaten.
For the marinated beef:
300 grams thinly sliced bulgogi beef
170 grams apple (or nashi pear), peeled
1 large garlic clove, peeled
10 grams fresh ginger, peeled
10 grams spring onions
40ml soy sauce
20ml rice wine
20 grams corn syrup
5ml sesame oil
½ tsp fine sea salt
For the broth:
1 litre prepared Korean beef broth
250 grams white radish, peeled
2-3 Korean or Japanese leeks
3 pieces dried kelp, about 5cm x 2.5cm
Soup soy sauce, as necessary
Fish sauce, as necessary
For the other ingredients:
1 small onion, about 200 grams, peeled
100 grams white shimeji mushrooms
60 grams flat chives
3-5 spring onions
100 grams chrysanthemum leaves
1-2 blocks medium-firm bean curd, about 225 grams each
8 fresh shiitake mushrooms
120 grams Korean sweet potato noodles
Frozen mandu (optional)
Fresh wheat noodles (optional)
To serve:
Steamed short-grain rice
Kimchi and banchan of choice
Gochujang (Korean chilli paste)
Soy sauce
Sesame oil
Toasted sesame seeds
Spring onions, minced
1 Marinate the beef. Roughly chop the apple, garlic, ginger and spring onions and put them in the bowl of a food processor or blender. Add the soy sauce, rice wine, corn syrup, sesame oil and salt, and blend to a purée.
2 Put the beef into a bowl, add the marinade, then mix. Marinate at room temperature, for at least 30 minutes, while preparing the other ingredients. If you are using a commercial marinade, pour 250ml of the marinade over the beef and mix thoroughly.
3 Make the broth. Pour the beef broth into a medium-size saucepan, add 200ml of cold water and bring to a boil over a medium flame.
4 Cut the white radish lengthwise into halves or quarters, then slice about 5mm thick. Thoroughly wash the leeks, then cut off the white and pale green parts and set them aside. Cut the dark green leek leaves into large pieces.
5 Add the white radish and leek tops to the broth and simmer over a low flame for 10 minutes. Add the dried kelp pieces and simmer for one minute. Use chopsticks to remove the kelp and leek tops. Taste the broth and add soup soy sauce and/or fish sauce, to taste. It should taste a little strong on its own.
6 Cut the onion in half, then slice it into 1cm-wide pieces. Place these in the bottom of a pot.
7 Cut the white and pale green parts of the leeks into 2.5cm pieces. Cut off and discard the woody part of the shimeji mushrooms, then break them into clumps. Trim off and discard the tough stem-ends of the chives. Cut the chives and spring onions into 3cm pieces. Thoroughly rinse the chrysanthemum leaves, then drain them. Slice each block of bean curd into six pieces.
8 Attractively arrange the leeks, shimeji mushrooms, chives, spring onions, chrysanthemum leaves, bean curd, shiitake mushrooms and sweet potato noodles in the pot, leaving room at the centre. (It’s OK if the ingredients hang over the sides slightly.) Remove the beef from the marinade and place into the centre of the ingredients in the pot.
9 Pour about 600ml of broth into the pot and bring to a simmer over a medium-high flame. The ingredients will soften as they heat, and can be pushed down into the pot so they are submerged. Add more broth to almost fill the pot, then cover the pot with a lid and simmer over a medium flame for about 10 minutes, or until the ingredients are fully cooked. Add more broth if it seems dry.
10 Serve with the rice, kimchi and banchan. Let your guests make a dipping sauce for the beef by mixing the gochujang with soy sauce, sesame oil, sesame seeds and minced spring onions.
11 After eating most of the ingredients, add the radish that was cooked with the broth, and the mandu and/or noodles, stirring in more broth as necessary. If you run out of broth, use plain water.
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