Deep Kim Chee and Chicken

Let's take the chicken first.

While foraging at Kroger's the other day I noticed a new display of sauces and marinades in the "international" aisle.

Korean.

I don't know much about Korean cooking other than grilling meat seems to be popular, as well as fermented cabbage known as Kim Chee.  I bought a jar of bar-b-que sauce and tried it out on some chicken.

I marinated the chicken, breasts and legs, in the sauce for a couple of hours then grilled and basted them on the barbie.

One thing I noticed about the sauce was that it was sweeter than soy sauce marinates I had used for chicken in the past which consisted of soy sauce, sesame oil, garlic, scallions, ginger, salt and pepper.  No sugar, well duh!

On-line I found a YouTube video describing how to cook up a Korean BBQ sauce and it involved a lot of sugar, caramelized, with other ingredients, so maybe the sweetness is a hallmark of Korean cooking.

Dunno.  Something new to investigate!

As for Kim Chee, I had a bad experience the first time I bought some.  Back in the 90's there was an expression, "You're in deep Kim Chee!" meaning you're in trouble.  In deep something.

I discovered our supermarket sold Kim Chee and bought a jar not knowing what to expect.  Well, Kim Chee is fermented cabbage and it is under pressure in the jar.  Once you open the lid it "releases" and tries to escape.  There is no point in trying to stop the process by putting the lid back on.  That's impossible.  The Kim Chee is coming out!

Fortunately, I had opened the jar because I wanted to eat some of it, but I had to eat more than I planned just to get the lid back on!

I learned from the experience.

I now give Kim Chee as gifts to friends who have never had it.  Oh, yeah, hi-parry-ous!