On Demand Gochujang

Previously, on tastingmenu.wordpress.com –
* https://tastingmenu.wordpress.com/2017/04/24/nobu-toro-rossa-sauce/
* https://tastingmenu.wordpress.com/2020/12/05/reproducing-michibas-korean-style-monkfish-stew-pot/
* https://tastingmenu.wordpress.com/2021/05/15/a-dinner-idea-inspired-by-lamb-ribchops-morimoto-doha/
* https://tastingmenu.wordpress.com/2024/03/09/on-chili-garlic-sauce/

In the continuing quest to replace my chili products, I now needed to find a way to make gochujang paste with my recently acquired package of Lakehouse Farms Gochugaru. I suppose I was in the same situation Matsuhisa-sama was in when he first went to Peru and had to recreate various standard Japanese sauces/dressings.

Organic American Produced Gochugaru

Trying to educate myself on the matter, I learned that gochujang takes months to ferment. I did find a web resource for quick gochujang that caught my interest which I found here: https://kimchimari.com/homemade-gochujang-recipe-easy-quick/

‘quick’ gochujang cast (clockwise): fermented soy bean flour, sake, gochugaru, sweet rice flour, rice/barley syrup, sea salt

sweet rice flour for the microbatch

That ‘quick/instant’ recipe apparently takes a couple of hours as opposed to months. But I needed to scale the recipe down since 4 cups worth seemed to be a lot to keep in the refridgerator (and there are other dinner menu items I have planned during the week that isn’t Korean….). After doing some math, I decided the microbatch that might be a useful amount was:

first 1/4 c of boiled hot water

2nd 3 T of boiled hot water

1/4 C Korean gochugaru for gochujang (fine chili powder for gochujang 고운고추가루)
3T meju powder (aka mejugaru – fermented soybean powder, 메주가루)
1T sweet rice flour (glutinous rice; 찹쌀가루)
1T sea salt
2T rice syrup (jocheong 조청) – here I used 1 T because I thought it might be too sweet
1/4 c + 3T water
3/8t green plum syrup (maesil cheong; 매실청) – optional
soju or sake – optionally if too thick to thin it out – I ended up using 2T sake, 2T boiling water

water brought to the boil

addition of sweet rice flour

If I understand it correctly, the process of making this on-demand gochujang requires a sweet rice flour (glutinous rice flour) boiled and whisked. I gathered starting with boiling water THEN whisking in the rice

trying to whisk to blend and break up any lumps

flour would be a good start and then lowering the heat to simmer for 10 minutes. During the simmer, I would need to continue stirring (whisking?) to make sure lumps did not form when creating this base paste.

measuring out the rice/barley syrup

The rice syrup would follow into the paste and that would needed to be blended it in. And then THAT

whisking in the syrup on a simmer

mixture would need to simmer for about 25 minutes with the volume reducing down to 80%. At that point, that mixture could be transferred to another container to cool to room temperature (and/or put

chilling the base in ice water – it cooled really fast for this microbatch

that container in an ice bath to speed the cooling process) – this microbatch seemed reach room temperature in about 30 minutes. When that rice flour/rice syrup mixture had cooled, it would be ready to add the remaining ingredients.

portioning out the sea salt…

..then the 3 T of the fermented soy bean powder

1/4 c of the organic gochugaru chili flake/powder

So in would go the fermented soybean powder (meju), the hand crushed gochugaru and salt. That entire mixture would have to be well blended.

in with the soy bean powder

in with the chili

and finally the salt

As it would turn out, it was a mistake to use a whisk on this as everything clumped and seized up. So I turned to my silicon spatula to see if I could blend it into a smooth paste.

“lumpy and NOT smooth”

At this point, the sauce was way too thick. So, I added 2 tablespoons of sake (maybe “nikiri sake” next time) and then 2 tablespoons of boiled hot water to thin out the paste-intended mixture. Once the additional liquid was part of the mixture, I was able to evenly blend and smooth out the mixture into a nice workable paste.

Now this gochujang looks and handles like the commercial version

Now the on-demand gochujang would be ready for use. Unexpectedly, when I moved the gochujang to a clean airtight glass container, it appeared to be much less that the expected yield of close to a cup. A

On demand gochujang ready for use!

quick taste test first provided a salty hit, then the spice hit then a very mild sweetness with a slighty acid aftertaste. My wife thought that the sweetness came across as ‘flat’ and wondered aloud if 1 tablespoon of brown sugar to replaced the dropped tablespoon of rice/barley syrup might work. I have to wonder if I can drop half the amount of salt to round the balance of the gochujang flavor.

I’m looking forward to using this gochujang with Iron Chef Michiba’s Korean-style Monkfish Stew and perhaps Broiled Lamb painted with gochujang as inspired by Iron Chef Morimoto’s Doha restaurant.

Resource
Lakehouse Farms Gochugaru – Amazon (https://www.amazon.com/Lakehouse-Farms-Organic-Korean-Gochugaru/dp/B0982CCH88)