The Author's Kitchen, South Korea Style Quiz

Answer: Napa cabbage

Napa cabbage is a type of cabbage found in East Asia, which gets its name from 'nappa', a Japanese word for vegetable leaves (if you're a fan of 'Dragonball Z', in which many characters are named after vegetables, you might remember Nappa, Vegeta's sidekick).

It originally came from Beijing, and is oblong in shape rather than round. As well as baechu kimchi, its leaves are also used as wraps in Korean cuisine. To make baechu kimchi, the cabbage leaves are salted in brine, then washed and left to marinate and ferment for a day (traditionally in an earthenware pot called an onggi).

Answer: Gochujang

One of South Korea's most well-known condiments, gochujang is a chilli paste made with meju (fermented soybean powder), glutinous rice, chilli powder or gochu-garu, yeotgireum (barley malt powder), and salt. The rice gives it a sweetish taste, as sugars are created during the fermenting process. Like kimchi, it is traditionally fermented in an earthenware jar stored in an area known as the jangdokdae, an outside terrace which is preferably near the kitchen and in a sunny area. In the South Korean village of Sunchang, a Fermented Food Festival is held every year, where visitors can make their own gochujang and enjoy barbecued meat and rice cakes.

(As for the other answers, which are also Asian chilli pastes, sriracha is from Thailand, jeow bong is from Laos and doubanjiang is Chinese.)

Answer: Soybean paste

Doenjang is a paste made with fermented soybeans and brine, and is often a byproduct of guk-ganjang (soup soy sauce) production. To make doenjang, soybeans are soaked overnight, boiled, crushed into paste and made into meju bricks, which are left to dry for several weeks. Once dried, the bricks are traditionally tied to the eaves of the house roof or placed in an ondol, a room with underfloor heating, to ferment. They are then placed in onggi with charcoal and chillies, which not only enhance the flavour, but are also said to drive out evil spirits!

Doenjang is used as a base broth for doenjang-jjigae, along with dried anchovies and white radish; however, the other ingredients of the jjigae itself can vary from province to province. These ingredients may include tofu (like the one pictured), potatoes, meat or seafood.

Answer: Rice cakes

Tteokbokki are small rice cakes made from non-glutinous rice flour, which is steamed, pounded and then rolled into long cylinders called garae-tteok, before being cut into smaller pieces. The ones here appear to be served with a red gochujang-based sauce.

Other variants include ganjang tteokbokki, which is made with soy sauce and sometimes contains other ingredients such as beef or sesame seeds; rose tteokbokki, a pasta-like dish with a creamy sauce; gireum tteokbokki, which is fried in oil; and cheese tteokbokki, where the tteokbokki are stuffed with cheese.

They can also be served with noodles, boiled eggs or eomuk (Korean fishcakes).

Answer: Beef

Pork bulgogi also exists, but beef is the most popular meat of choice, from sirloin to ribeye. Bulgogi ('fire meat', after the way in which it is cooked) is a gui, or meat dish, made with thin marinated slices of beef (ribeye is a popular choice due to its tenderness).

The marinade includes garlic, sesame oil, sugar and soy sauce, and may also include additional ingredients such as spring onions or ginger. Sometimes onions or fruit such as kiwis or pineapples are used to help tenderise the meat. In South Korean burger bars, you can buy bulgogi burgers, where the meat patty is marinaded in bulgogi sauce and served with the usual accompanying vegetables and cheese.

Answer: Bibimbap

Bibimbap is traditionally served in a bowl, and consists of cooked rice topped off with kimchi or other vegetables, beef, and sometimes a raw or fried egg like the dish pictured here. The bibimbap variant in the picture is known as dolsot-bibimbap, after the heated stone pot (dolsot) in which it is served; the egg is cooked against the sides of the pot, and sesame oil is drizzled on the bottom to help fry the rice. The different colours of bibimbap ingredients are said to traditionally represent different body parts; black ingredients, such as shiitake mushrooms, represent the kidneys, while green ingredients, such as spinach, represent the liver and orange or red ingredients, such as carrots, represent the heart.

As for the other answers, bureom is a collection of mixed nuts, commonly eaten at Daeboreum (a festival celebrating the first full moon of the new year Korean calendar); buchimgae is a pancake containing egg; and begodya are steamed buns popular among the Korean community in Uzbekistan.

Answer: Gimbap

Gimbap, or kimbap, is South Korea's answer to norimaki, and are thought to be a result of Japanese occupation during the Second World War, though some historians have argued that it is the other way round and norimaki was in fact influenced by gimbap. Like norimaki, gimbap consists of cooked rice with a centre made from chopped vegetables, seafood or meat, which is then wrapped in seaweed (gim or kim). Gimbap is a staple dish found in dosirak, Korean packed meals which feature cooked rice and side dishes, or banchan. The seaweed wrapping can be brushed with sesame oil or fried in egg.

As for the other answers, gyeongdan are sweet rice ball cakes, gyeran-jjim is an egg dish which is a kind of savoury custard, and gejang is a fermented crab dish.

Answer: Cucumber

'Oi' is the Korean word for 'cucumber', and oi muchim is Korean cucumber salad. 'Namul' means spring greens, but can also be used to refer to Korean vegetable dishes, with the vegetable in question often being cut into thin strips (like the one in the picture).

The traditional seasoning for namul includes soy sauce, sesame oil, garlic and sugar, though gochujang is sometimes used as well to add a bit of a kick. As well as conventional salad vegetables, namuls can also contain seaweeds or muk, a jelly-like substance made from beans or seeds.

They are often served as side dishes at meals.

Answer: Stir-frying

A bokkeum is a Korean stir-fry, and although 'galbi' means 'rib', dak-galbi is not actually a spare ribs dish - it's a chicken stir-fry. The chicken is marinated and then cooked in a sweet sauce with the ubiquitous gochujang. One of the more modern dishes in this quiz, dak-galbi originated in the 1960s as an anju, or a dish meant to be served with alcohol (soju, a grain-based alcohol, being a popular accompaniment) in the taverns of Chuncheon.

It was also a cheaper alternative to gui as it did not need to be cooked on a grill. Chuncheon has an annual Mak-Guksu and Dak-Galbi Festival, with stalls selling dak galbi and makguksu (buckwheat noodles, another local speciality).

Answer: Goguma mattang

Goguma mattang are deep-fried sweet potatoes coated in caramelised sugar, and sometimes served with sesame seeds or chopped nuts. The dish is thought to have originated in China, in particular the cooking technique known as básī, which involves making sugar syrup. Ideally, the sugar syrup should have threads coming out of it. Some variants use corn syrup or honey instead of sugar for the caramel.

As for the other answers, kkul-tarae (Korean court cake) is a cake-like sweet made with thread-like dough and filled with chopped nuts or chocolate; okchun-dang is a red-coloured sweet served at traditional ceremonies; and gwapyeon is a fruit jelly.