Jajangmyun - Korean Black Bean Noodles

SMILE! Oh Phil, didn't his mom ever teach him not to play with his food. Gotta admit, that smiling bowl of noodles is kinda cute/creepy.

If you recall, we ate jajangmyun at the Korean supermarket and Phil really liked it. So for our belated Valentine's Day celebration, I wanted to try my hand at a new dish while also making him something he liked. This is how I treat him after he gave me the flu. They should make national Girlfriend Day after how good I am at being one. Jajangmyun is like Korean spaghetti but with black bean sauce. I always figured it would be pretty simple but was not motivated to try until Sherbear posted about it. Following the recipe via her link, I purchased the following items:

black bean sauce, Korean radish, Korean cucumbers, and noodles, just to highlight a few items

Chunjang (black bean paste) is the key ingredient to this dish. It makes up the sauce which gives all the black bean flavor to the dish.

Here's what it looks like opened up. Black like tar. Smells like black bean paste. hehe

One of the steps is to heat 7 tbsp of this in some oil in a pan. Here I am globbing it on.

In a separate pan, I had cooked some cubed beef in veggie oil. mmm the beef alone was really yummy.

After dicing up all the other veggies and sauteeing them for a few minutes in the pan with the meat, I added water and boiled it for another 10-15mins before adding the heated black bean paste. This is what the sauce looks like.

Cook some noodles, strain, and rinse and add the sauce on top to serve.

Here's the final product served with sliced cucumbers on top. Excuse the messy presentation, it is a messy dish afterall. Despite looking so gross, it was actually quite delicious. The noodle is best eaten when piping hot and the sliced cucumber makes a big difference. I followed directions literally and added the Korean radish. It was a bad choice because the radish was bitter and took away from what would have been a good dish. Neither of us finished our plates because this is so hearty and filling. I've also been trying to finish the leftovers for the last few days so I'm really sick of it. Next time I'll put only beef, onions, and mushroom. No cucumbers except as garnish because they get mushy when cooked. Definitely no radish.

As a side dish, I made the persian cucumber salad that I've made before for my family. Can't go wrong with this and the sour taste cuts right through the heavy black bean sauce. These two go very well together.

My Vday treat for myself is this fancy $2.29 a bottle Asian peach drink that I always eye but never want to spend on because its just an unnecessary splurge.

I treated Phil to a big bottle of Sapporo after work. Woop woop. Happy Valentine's Day to us!

If you want to make jajangmyun, you can find good directions at maangchi. This lady makes the best Korean food tutorials. I used her recipe for the japchae also.