How much kimchi can you eat?


When kids write essays about traditional Korean stuff, they often write about kimchi. In case you don't know (just as I didn't before I decided to move to Korea), kimchi is spicy fermented cabbage. It is eaten constantly in Korea. My students ask if I know what kimchi is, which is a ridiculous question because it is eaten at every meal in Korea. You can't go to a restaurant and not have them grab for the large tupperware and dish out kimchi into a bowl. It doesn't matter what you are eating, you get some sort of kimchi. There are actually many kinds of kimchi, and they are each served on their own little dish. A typical Korean meal involves a table covered in small dishes. I would hate to be a dishwasher in Korea, and oddly enough, most people don't have an automatic dishwasher in their homes. As usual, I am going off on a tangent. Back to the importance of kimchi in Korean culture. Koreans love the stuff. Kimchi is eaten with all kinds of food. Our Korean "mom" serves us kimchi with spaghetti, cookies, and pretty much everything we eat at her home.


Yesterday, we had the delight of making kimchi with Korean "mom." Of course, before making kimchi, we had to eat brunch. In case you are wondering what brunch means in Korea, it was kimchi (of course), rice, meat, broccoli, oysters, peanuts, and eggs. It's not what I would normally think of when someone says the word "brunch," but hey, I am in Korea. After eating, we sat on the newspapers laid out on the floor and got to work. Korean "mom" busted out a huge tub of salty red pepper paste and garbage bags (yes, that is plural, there was more than one bag) of salted cabbage. At first, Paco and I were only observers because we "might get clothes dirty." We watched as "mom" took the heads of cabbage one by one and covered each individual leaf with the red pepper paste. After a while, we convinced "mom" to let us help. We put on plastic gloves and started rubbing the paste onto the cabbage. We did this for a few hours before we had to leave to go to work. When we left, there was a sizable garbage can filled with our newly made kimchi, and "mom" showed no signs of stopping until all of the cabbage was used. I asked her how long it would take her and her son to eat that much kimchi. She solemnly replied "six months." I was blown away. This tiny Korean woman is going to eat a garbage can worth of kimchi. I am guessing that the garbage can ended up weighing as much as she does.

On a random note, Korean "mom" just got accepted to teach Korean in Ecuador for 30 months. So Paco and I will likely head to South America net year. Anyone want to go to Machu Picchu with me?