A Simple Korean Comfort Food We Made from Our Garden
A cold night is coming to our Calgary garden, so we picked some fresh vegetables before the temperature dropped.
Today, we are making Korean Doenjang Jjigae, a warm and simple Korean soybean paste stew.
We are using zucchini from our garden, along with handmade tofu, onions, mushrooms, potatoes, garlic, and Korean chives. It feels especially nice to turn the vegetables we just picked from the garden into a warm pot of stew on a cold night.
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This is not a fancy restaurant recipe. It is the kind of food we like to make at home when we want something warm, savory, and comforting.
The nice thing about doenjang jjigae is that we do not have to use exactly the same vegetables every time. If we have zucchini instead of zucchini, we can use zucchini. If we do not have mushrooms, we can simply leave them out. We usually look at what we have in the refrigerator and make the stew from there.
What Is Doenjang Jjigae (된장찌게)?
Ingredients
For about 4~5 servings, we use:
- 50 g Korean soybean paste (doenjang 된장)
- About 130 g zucchini
- About 130 g onion
- About 130 g mushrooms
- About 130 g tofu
- About 130 g potato
- 1 tablespoon minced garlic
- 20 g Korean chives (buchu 부추)
- 2 Korean soup stock cubes
- 2 cups water
We do not need to worry if we are missing one or two vegetables. This is a flexible home-cooking recipe, and using the vegetables we already have is part of the fun.
How We Make Our Doenjang Jjigae
1. Cut the vegetables
First, we wash and prepare all the vegetables.
We cut the zucchini, onion, mushrooms, potato, and tofu into bite-size pieces. We mince the garlic and cut the Korean chives into small pieces.
We try to keep the vegetables a similar size so they cook more evenly. Since potatoes usually take longer to cook than softer vegetables, we will put the potato into the pot earlier.
2. Cook the onion and potato with doenjang
Put the doenjang, onion, and potato into a pot.
We cook them over medium heat for about 3~4minutes. We are not trying to brown the vegetables. Instead, we want the onion and potato to release some of their natural juices while the doenjang coats the vegetables.
This short step gives the stew a deeper homemade flavor.
We used homemade doenjang this time, but store-bought doenjang works just as well. The important thing to remember is that the salt level can be very different from one type of doenjang to another.
3. Add water and soup stock
Add 2 cups of water and two soup stock cubes to the pot. Turn the heat to high and bring the stew to a boil. Cook until the potato is about halfway done.
Most Korean cooks use anchovy broth for doenjang jjigae because it gives the stew a rich and deep flavor.
We usually use anchovy broth too, but this time we had Korean soup stock cubes on hand, so we used two of them instead.
If you do not have anchovy broth, you can simply use plain water. The stew will still taste good because the doenjang and vegetables provide plenty of flavor. However, the broth will not have the same deep and rich taste that you get from anchovy broth.
4. Add zucchini mushrooms, and garlic
When the potato is partly cooked, we add the zucchini, mushrooms, and minced garlic.
We give everything a gentle stir and continue cooking.
We would add the zucchini a little later because zucchini can become soft fairly quickly.
We also do not want to cook the zucchini for too long. We like it soft enough to eat easily while still keeping some of its shape.
5. Add the tofu near the end
When the zucchini is almost fully cooked, we add the tofu.
We prefer to add tofu near the end because soft tofu can break apart if we stir the stew too much. Adding it later helps us keep larger pieces of tofu in the finished stew.
After adding the tofu, we let the stew simmer for a few more minutes so the tofu becomes hot and absorbs some of the doenjang flavor.
6. Taste and finish
Now comes one of the most important parts: tasting the broth before adding more salt. Because doenjang brands and homemade batches vary in saltiness, always check the flavor first. If needed, add a little Korean soup soy sauce (guk-ganjang 국간장) or salt.
Finally, we added finely chopped chives from the garden. If you don't have chives, you can use green onions instead.
One gentle stir, and our garden-fresh doenjang jjigae is ready.
A Few Things We Like About This Recipe
The best thing about this stew is its flexibility.
You don't need to make a special grocery trip if you're missing a vegetable—just use whatever you have in the refrigerator.
The basic formula is simple: Doenjang + vegetables + tofu + broth = a comforting Korean stew.
Just remember to be careful with salt. Since doenjang is naturally salty, always taste near the end and adjust the seasoning last.
Why We Love Using Garden Vegetables
For us, this stew is more than just a recipe.
We picked the zucchini from our garden. We used handmade tofu. Then we prepared the vegetables and watched everything slowly come together in one pot.
That makes the meal feel different from simply opening a package and putting dinner on the table.
The zucchini also gives the stew a gentle sweetness as it cooks, which balances the salty and savory flavor of the doenjang.
We enjoy recipes like this because they remind us that good food does not always have to be complicated.
Final Thoughts
We started this pot with a simple idea: use what we had.
A zucchini from the garden, handmade tofu, a few vegetables, and some doenjang turned into a warm pot of Korean comfort food.
We did not need perfect ingredients or complicated cooking techniques.
We simply cooked the harder vegetables first, added the softer vegetables later, tasted the broth, and adjusted the seasoning at the end.
That is what we enjoy about home cooking.
We do not have to make everything perfect. We just need good ingredients, a little patience, and a willingness to taste as we go.
If you have some vegetables waiting in your refrigerator, we hope you will give this simple Korean doenjang jjigae a try.
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