RECIPE: KIMCHI Mung Bean PANCAKE (Bindaetteok)
One of our favourite dishes from the restaurant, made easy for cooking at home.
Stu and I first saw these being made in Gwangjang foodmarket in Seoul — for Stu it was love at first sight, he was fascinated by the simplicity of the set up. The mungbeans are ground between two stone discs, the fresh paste then added to hot oil — unbelievably simple — it’s all mungbreans just shallow fried, their edges crisping up, then they’re served in foil and you add your sauces. It’s a substantial snack, great for hard working city-goers on the move…and right now, home Isolates too !
Our pancake is quick to make, but needs some prep. Start a day ahead, and soak your mung beans in plenty of water so that they rehydrate. That red miso dressing — so good ! Can also be made ahead of time. We used kimchi in our pancake here, and bacon — but you can easily make this vegetarian and replace the kimchi with some fresh chopped chilli and mushrooms.
The trickiest thing about this recipe is flipping the pancake.
For tips and videos of the pancake cook, check out our instagram
and look for our Lockdown recipes in our stories:
You will need
FOR TWO PANCAKES:
400g mung beans, soaked in water overnight (make sure they are well covered in water, as they will expand) then drained.
2 cloves of garlic, finely chopped
2 cm knob of ginger, finely chopped
150g fresh bean sprouts
3 x spring onions (greens) finely sliced
150g kimchi, finely chopped
3-5 x rashers of streaky bacon cut in half
80ml soy — we use a light Japanese soy sauce
40g rice flour — for thickening the pancake mix
A neutral oil for cooking
FOR DRESSING THE PANCAKE
Japanese mayo
Red miso dressing: 15gmsake, 15g mirin, 60g sugar, 100g red miso.
Place sake, mirin and sugar into a pot and bring to a simmer, then whisk in the miso paste.
Remove from heat and chill. — Easy and soooo delicious.
FOR THE SLAW
1/8 white cabbage, 1/8 red cabbage
3 spring onions finely sliced (white parts)
50g bean sprouts
2T Kimchi juice
Generous pinch or two of roasted white sesame seeds.
METHOD
Heat your oven to 200C.
Blitz your rehydrated mung beans with a little fresh water (1T or so, not too much) until smooth and creamy.
Make one pancake at a time — halving your ingredients:
In a bowl, combine the mung bean mix with the soy sauce, fresh mung bean sprouts, garlic, ginger, spring onions, and kimchi. Mix to combine.
If the mixture is quite wet, and doesn’t hold itself together in a loose wet ball, add some rice flour to thicken. See our photos and videos on instagram to get a sense of the consistency. You want a similar consistency to a corn fritter.
In a small hot, non-stick oven-proof frypan (if you have one, otherwise a normal pan is fine, just make double sure your oil is hot) — fry the pancake mix on one side until you can see the edges are starting to brown and crisp up. About 5 mins.
Lay 3-4 rashers of bacon on top of the uncooked side of the pancake as shown. Press the bacon down slightly so that it adheres to the pancake mix (and won’t fly off when you flip it !).
At this point we drained off some of the excess oil in the pan — so if you think you’ve added too much oil, do the same before you flip the pancake so that it doesn’t splash you. Be very careful Beasty.
When the underside is nicely browned, carefully flip or turn the pancake over and let the bacon cook on the stovetop for another few minutes. The pancake is quite thick so finish it in a hot oven (in the pan) for 5 minutes to make sure it cooks through.
The pancake is ready when it is firm when pressed, and nicely browned on both sides. If your bacon isn’t crispy once you take the pancake out of the oven, finish it on the stovetop on a medium heat for a couple of minutes. Total cooking time is about 12 minutes.
TIME TO PLATE !
Carefully turn out the hot pancake onto a paper towel, bacon side up, and cut into wedges.
Transfer to a plate, and dress with Japanese mayo (see photos and videos for how Chef likes this done !) and then the red miso dressing — then at the last minute, dress your slaw and pile it up on the pancake to finish.
This is an epic lunch or dinner, so savoury and moreish — the kimchi giving just a little heat, the mayo and red miso adding creamy sweetness, and the slaw giving the crunch and refreshing acidity. We shared one pancake between two of us for lunch, for dinner you could easily eat a whole one yourself.
The rice flour keeps this dish gluten free, its also dairy free, and easy to make vegan if you prefer. E X