Adventures in Korean Cooking!

We've always loved eating Korean food - ever since we knew we'd be adopting a baby from Korea, we've tried to learn a bit about the culture and the food.

We've been blessed to meet some amazing people within the Korean community, both in Toronto and in Ottawa. I've read about making lots of different dishes, and we've tried different things at various restaurants (although we keep returning to some favourite dishes), but I hadn't done a lot of Korean cooking at home.

One of the things I've wanted for years is a Korean grill. They are cool little tabletop grills that you get in restaurants for cooking different dishes at the table. Chris surprised me with a new grill for Christmas this year, so I was eager to try it out. I'd also bought some Korean marinades at a local Korean grocery store when a friend visited Ottawa a couple of months ago, so I decided to bite the bullet and try doing some cooking on my own.

Some of our favourite dishes include Bulgogi (thinly sliced beef that is marinaded in a slightly sweet soy sauce mixture and then grilled), yachae jeon (pancakes with veggies) and mandu (dumplings). I bought some beef at the local Korean grocery (it is pre-sliced), and also some frozen mandu (I want to learn to make these from scratch). I made some Korean rice, the veggie pancakes and the bulgogi. We love eating the bulgogi the traditional way, where you take a nice fresh lettuce leaf, put some hot pepper sauce, rice and meat in the lettuce and wrap it up - almost like a Korean burrito. It is yummy and I learned a lot through some trial and error, especially with the dipping sauces and the veggie pancakes.

I can't wait to try out some new recipes as well! I've been collecting some great Korean recipes, and also some cool bookbooks, so it will be fun experimenting and learning more about Korean culture and food.



Cut up veggies for yachae jeon (veggie pancakes)




Lettuce wraps - very yummy with the bulgogi



Cooking the yachae jeon - still perfecting the technique



Ready to eat!



Cooking the bulgogi on our amazing new
Korean grill



Lettuce, rice, garlic and bulgogi ready to be wrapped up and devoured



Freshly sliced garlic to cook on grill with beef

Alex loves his bulgogi!

Christmas Fun

We had such a great Christmas in London and Toronto with our families. We started off by dropping off Strider to camp in Arnprior. He had a great time at "Dogs at Camp" and Cheryl (the owner of Dogs at Camp in Arnprior) was nice enough to send us updates on how much fun Strider was having. He always has so much fun and loves playing with the other dogs. Here's some fun pictures of Strider's time at camp, including his new "girlfriend" Annie... who outweighs him by a fair bit (she's the St Bernard) *laughs*.

Strider is the one on the bottom - it's more fun than it looks.

Running outside with Annie

Cuddles with Cheryl and the other dogs

Ready for Christmas

He's almost 100 lbs... see how small he looks!

Strider and Annie inside



More of Annie and Strider (he's so tiny)

 We then made our way to Toronto and stayed at Kathy's place for a quick visit before going out to London to visit Karen, Lew, Sarah and Amanda - I finally got to meet Amanda's boyfriend, Andrew (such a nice guy) and we had an incredible time with them.

We got to have a great turkey dinner, hang out with them, see their beautiful horse and have the kids come back to the hotel we were staying at for a swim with Alex and Chris.

It was hard to leave London...we miss them all so much and it's hard being so far away. I'm kicking myself that I forgot my camera when we were at Karen's place... didn't get any pictures, but if I get some from them, I will be sure to post them.

After that, we drove back to Toronto and started getting ready for Christmas. I was starting to feel like my cold and cough were coming back, so I didn't have as much energy as I'd hoped to be able to get out and do some fun things in Toronto. Alex had an amazing time with Sarah and Kian, and they got to do some fun stuff.

Christmas morning was a bit chaotic as my mother was quite sick with what turned out to be a bronchial infection, ear infection and throat infection (I came down with it two days later). Even with a few of us being sick, and the busy schedules, it was still an incredible Christmas and Alex got a lot of the things he asked for (and a few he didn't ask for lol).

Here's a bunch of pictures from our time in Toronto and what Alex did to keep busy and have fun.

Alex and Sarah had fun in the hot tub

The kids kept jumping out to roll in snow and then jump back into hot tub

Making a gingerbread house



Sarah working on her gingerbread house



Getting the details the way he wants them



Sarah did hers with no help from me!




Such concentration



Trying out another Christmas craft - not sure how well it worked



Jen tolerating me taking pics of her with the kids



More fun in the hot tub

Decorating gingerbread cookies for Santa (Jen made the cookies for the kids)

Goofy grin

Working hard on the cookies for Santa

Sarah made cookies for Santa too

Kian and Alex had fun with Jenny's new iPad

Christmas Eve dinner

Sarah working on her letter to Santa

Alex working on his letter - in FRENCH!



Sarah's cookies and letter to Santa



Sarah with her cookies

Alex's cookies and letter to Santa - he wanted to do the whole thing in French!



Christmas Morning!



Waiting for Alex to wake up

The kids get to see the presents!



Waiting to open presents



Jen on Christmas morning



Kian being cute and hiding in a box



Steve hanging out

Kathy getting a great present from Steve with pics from their
recent trip to Hawaii



Alex opening up his new light saber - one of his fav gifts!



Sarah was so excited to get this from Santa



Another fav present - boxing gloves! Chris is
usually the punching bag

 

Opening up the big present from Santa - the
meditation cushion he asked for!



Showing us how to use the cushion



Skating at a local park with Sarah and Jen