A Variety of Chamnamul Recipes for Simple Yet Elegant Home-Cooked Meals

Chamnamul has a mild aroma and is nontoxic, making it ideal for blanching and serving as a seasoned vegetable. It is most commonly eaten raw and seasoned or blanched. To blanch chamnamul, trim and separate the stems from the leaves. It can be blanched without separating them, but doing so makes it easier to cook each part properly. Add salt to rapidly boiling water, blanch the stems first, and then add the remaining parts. Add the leaves after 2–30 seconds and blanch them, taking care not to overcook them so they retain their texture. Finally, cool and rinse them in cold water, squeeze out the moisture, and set aside. Beyond serving it raw and seasoned or blanched, chamnamul can be prepared in various ways for more flavorful and aromatic vegetable dishes. Here are some delicious chamnamul recipes.

To make seasoned chamnamul, add minced garlic and green onion to the blanched chamnamul described above, then toss it with seasoned soy sauce containing green onion, garlic, ground sesame seeds, black pepper, and sesame oil. To make stir-fried chamnamul, use the same recipe and simply stir-fry it in a pan.

1. Trim the chamnamul into bite-sized pieces, separating the stems from the leaves.

2. Blanch the stems first, add the leaves after 2–30 seconds, then rinse in cold water and set aside.

3. Add red pepper powder, gochujang, vinegar, soy sauce, sugar, and sesame oil. For a cleaner-tasting dish, omit the gochujang.

How to Make Beef Brisket and Chamnamul Salad

1. Trim the chamnamul into bite-sized pieces, separating the stems from the leaves.

2. Blanch the stems first, add the leaves after 2–30 seconds, then rinse in cold water and set aside.

3. Add the beef brisket, along with grilled beef brisket and blanched mung bean sprouts.

4. Add lemon juice, maesil syrup, vinegar, soy sauce, ground sesame seeds, sesame oil, and whole sesame seeds, then toss everything together.

[FAM Times = Reporter Kim Young-ji]