Friday, April 25, 2014

Foodie Fridays - Korean Seafood Pancake

I love Korean food. I love the mesh of sour and spiciness. When a person mentions Korean food, most would think of Bibimbap or Kim Chi soup. For Dumpling and I, it's Korean pancake and bulgogi (for her) spicy beef soup (for me!)

The seafood pancake is one item that we would always order when dining at any Korean restaurant. So I decided to try and cook on our own. Here's our attempt ;)

:: The gathering list

As our version is seafood pancake so basically it can be any seafood items which you like:

Pancake
1) Scallops (chopped into bits)
2) Shrimps (chopped into bits)
3) Spring Onions (I chopped mine into about 1.5 - 2" long)
4) Korean Pancake mix (Check the instructions on the packaging - for mine it was to mix 500gm with 800 ml of water. I halved that for one pancake. If you are using a pancake mix, no egg is required.)
4) Cooking Oil (I used about 3 table spoons, If if is not enough, you can add more along the way)

Optional: I sometimes add in crabsticks (kani) and if the kiddo is not eating, slivers of sliced red chili (seeds removed)


(This is the pancake mix we used)

Dipping Sauce 
1) Vinegar
2) Light Soy Sauce
3) Water
(Mix equal parts of the above - i.e 1/3 of each)
Optional: chopped garlic added to the dip (Dumpling is not into garlic so we pretty much leave this out)

:: Hot Tips

I decided to add a photo of "what not to do" as above. LOL. This was one of my earlier attempts where I made 3 rookie mistakes. 

1) I did not use a FLAT pan (which resulted in a nightmare of attempting to flip the pancake over without the bits of seafood falling out)

2) I added WAY TOO MUCH of the ingredients where the flour mix could not bind the seafood as it was too 'thick'

3) The ingredients were cut a tad too big and took forever to cook.

:: The cookout
1) Add a generous amount of oil into your pan. As I am terrible with flipping the pancake over, I used the HappyCall Pan instead. So, what I did was also to spread a bit of oil on the top 'lid' too.

2) Pour in enough pancake mix where it covers the entire base with a bit of 'batter' to spare and then add in your seafood and spring onions. Sprinkle them evenly.

3) Press down the seafood into the batter and wait till the bottom is browned. The trick is to cook initially on "high fire". This process takes quite long for me - to press and hold and yet wait for the seafood to cook. So please cut your seafood into smaller bits and add sparingly. I know of some people who will toss the seafood separately prior and you can do that too - it helps to shorten the cooking time.

4) When the bottom is browned and the seafood is cooked, add another thin layer of the pancake mix over the seafood and then close your HappyCall Pan 'lid' and flip the pancake over. Open up the lid and press down the pancake.

5) Prepare the dip. Cut pancake into sections and serve hot. :) (Dumpling likes the flour part because she likes the chewy feel. If you prefer the crispy version like me, diced up your ingredients to small bits and spread them out sparingly; this allows you to cook faster and coat better, making it flatter and crispier)




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