For those of us who cook on an almost daily basis, we feel confident at times with changing someone else’s recipe.  Most times we have success, but there are times when disaster strikes and we have to dump it. If it’s the latter, it’s often not a big deal – you can squash the idea or start all over again if you have extra ingredients and time. However, it’s especially disappointing when the ingredients cost you a fortune.

Why do we feel a need to change a recipe? We think we can make it better, less fattening, omit one or two “unnecessary” ingredients, cut down the prep time, baking time…. We also tend to change recipes with which we are familiar, and sometimes we are daring enough to take on foreign recipes that we enjoy when abroad or in a restaurant at home. For example, just recently, I decided to make my own Kimchi.

I am a fan of Korean cuisine and an avid viewer of Korean TV cooking shows, especially Arirang.  I recently saw a show on the history of Kimchi in Korea and since a good quality kimchee is kind of pricey, I decided to make my own. In the TV show, I saw variations of Kimchi made by several provinces in Korea, but the main ingredients were finely ground chili powder, radish (which I decided to omit), some had shredded carrots, spring onions, but I just wanted to make it with Napa cabbage and finely sliced Vidalia onions. Fermented soy bean paste (home-made and store-bought) was added to the finely ground pepper to make a paste, but in doing further research on the internet, you can use rice flour to make a porridge instead of using the soy bean paste. I live in a part of the country that does not stock “exotic” food stuff like soybean paste which I could have ordered from Amazon, but chose not to. I did not see rice flour in the supermarket, but I could have grounded some rice in the grain container of my Vitamix, but I chose not to. I combed the shelves of the supermarket aisle looking for anything chili– paste, powder, oil, anything hot. I had cayenne pepper and hot chili oil at home, but I wanted to see what I could find. And there it was – a dry packet of Chile mix that you add to ground beef to make Chili con Carne. Aside from having ground chili, garlic and other ingredients, it also had flour that would give me that paste. I felt I was on to something.  I bought the last Napa cabbage in the produce section and was anxious to make my Kimchi.

I recall the TV show featured various provinces which had slight variations in the recipes. The Napa cabbage was either soaked overnight in heavily salted water, or salt was added in between the leaves without the water. In either case, the leaves had to be washed several times to remove the salt. With either of these two methods, you then have to rinse out the salt well the next day.  I decided to soak the quartered Napa cabbage in a mild salt solution, trying to avoid a high salt content. The next morning, my Napa cabbage was as crisp as can be. I needed to get it wilted, so I decided to heat some water and soak it so it can get wilted and it did. I dried each quarter and proceeded to make my paste to mix in between the leaves.

I added some water to my skillet and then added the dry chili mix. I let it cook for a while to get rid of the flour taste and then added the thinly sliced onions to the pasty mixture and then turned off the stove. The mixture at this point had a deep, dark red color –not a vibrant red as I saw on TV, but it was still red. It also was a bit salty, because I made a mistake and added a touch of Mediterranean Sea salt. Why did I add the salt? I thought the cabbage was not wilted enough and that’s due to the small amount of salt I added to the water. To adjust the taste, I added some Hoisin sauce which is a bit sweet. The color changed to brown, the sauce was too pasty and the taste was not what I wanted. In any case, I waited for the paste to cool down and then smothered each leaf in the quartered piece. If you were making bulk Kimchi and storing them in earthen jars, you would keep them quartered. I only wanted a small portion, so I used only two quarters of the Napa cabbage since I was not pleased with the results and stored the other two to eat in a salad or stir fry. I cut the quarters into bite size pieces and stored it in a mason jar. The brown color was disturbing to me and an eyesore. It was packed to the rim when I first made it, but it was reduced by three-quarters next day. Two days have gone by and I have not tasted it as yet. I had made some  melt in your mouth pork belly which I simmered for hours, and placed it in lettuce leaves and top it with the Kimchi. It was edible, but not at all like the Kimchi I had in restaurants, or store bought.

What is the lesson learned? It’s okay to take a chance and alter a recipe, especially if the ingredients are not too costly. This recipe cost no more than $5, so it was not such a disaster, but I wish it had tasted better. The next time I attempt to make Kimchi, I will follow the directions as written. It’s all part of the cooking experience – trial and error. What if it did taste good, though? I would have been able to make Mexican Kimchi and shared it with everyone. Right now, I’ll keep this to myself. In fact, I didn’t even take photos of it to show you. So, there are times when you must stick to the recipe and this was certainly a time when I should have done so!