How to eat five kilograms of kimchi

Settle into your apartment in Seoul and decide to start cooking meals to save money. Ask your coworkers where the best place to buy kimchi is and be told that your school’s supplier will be the ideal and safest choice. Mention that you are interested in buying a small amount of kimchi to test the waters. Emphasize “small amount.”

Get caught off guard when a five-kilogram plastic bag of kimchi appears on your desk one afternoon.

Carry the bag home from school in a large Styrofoam box filled with several ice packs, making it weigh even more than the advertised five kilos. Take many photos to share with your friends on Facebook and Instagram – you’re becoming a “real Korean,” whatever that means. Get home and realize that wholesale kimchi has to be cut up once it comes out of the bag.

This is what 5 kilos of kimchi looks like.

Remove three whole pickled cabbages from the plastic bag and begin to butcher them on your small counter top.

One full cabbage. Two more to go!

Be relieved that no one ever has to see the red mess of kimchi splash that ends up all over your apartment as you begin the process.

Running low on containers…

Start to get nervous as your seven Tupperware containers start to fill up with freshly-cut kimchi, and it begins to look like you don’t have enough storage for all five kilos. Pack each container tightly and hope for the best. Put the leftover cabbage into a pot when you’ve filled the Tupperware and make a kimchi soup for dinner.

Kimchi, ramyeon, fish

Follow the advice of your fellow teachers and attempt to acquire used coffee grounds to store in your refrigerator to neutralize the overwhelming kimchi smell penetrating the Tupperware walls. Accidentally purchase a sizable bag of instant coffee instead and realize that it will not work the same as coffee grounds. Overpay for a small package of baking soda instead and hope that it holds you over for the time being.

Come home from work the next day and discover that the kimchi you so neatly packed into your Tupperware has somehow expanded and flooded the bottom of your refrigerator with kimchi juice. Remove everything from your fridge and wipe it down. Ignore the tears flowing down your cheeks as you eat a bunch of kimchi from each tub and drain the liquid to reduce the risk of recurrence. Come home from work the next day to find kimchi juice all over your fridge again. Convince yourself that your kimchi is, in fact, alive and trying to stage a revolt. Purchase several more containers and reduce the risk of another onslaught by filling each container only about three-fourths of the way.

Begin to plan meals that will deplete your kimchi supply to free up some of the Tupperware you own, as you can no longer store any other food in your refrigerator until you finish at least one of your eleven containers of pickled cabbage.

Make soup. Make a lot of soup. Make kimchi soup with ramyeon and fish, make kimchi soup with ramyeon and duck, make kimchi soup with ramyeon and pork. Rinse, lather, repeat. Buy large packs of ramyeon noodles and throw away the flavor packets – kimchi, sesame oil, and soy sauce make great broth and will reduce your MSG intake. Convince yourself that dried noodles are not making you fat.

Kimchi, ramyeon, duck, egg

Invite a friend over for a kimchi fiasco. Over-plan a menu that includes five different kimchi dishes. Realize you only have one burner in your kitchen but try to execute the menu anyway. Cook kimchi with fried tofu, a kimchi pan-fried pancake, kimchi and eggs, kimchi fries, and kimchi ramen with pork. Tell yourself over and over that room temperature food is acceptable because you tried to make five hot dishes on one burner and failed miserably. Never invite a friend over for a kimchi fiasco again as you shower yourself in shame.

Five lukewarm kimchi dishes

Make more soup.

Kimchi, ramyeon, fish (again)

Go back to basics and remember that kimchi is often eaten by itself as a side dish. Proceed to eat as much as you can (you ordered five kilograms, remember?) with random items you have in your fridge.

Kimchi, egg, fish, pork belly, and fish cake

Kimhi, pizza, pork belly, fish, ramyeon

Kimchi and pork belly

Make the easiest kimchi dish you can think of – kimchi fried rice. Make it with fish. Make it with pork belly. Make it with fried eggs. Make it with ground beef. Make it with all of the above.

Kimchi fried rice with ground meat and egg

Kimchi fried rice with pork belly and egg

More kimchi fried rice with pork belly and egg

Kimchi fried rice with pork belly, fish, and egg

All of the fried rice!

Do it all over again with pan fried ramyeon instead of rice.

Pan fried ramyeon with kimchi, pork belly, and egg

Pan fried kimchi ramyeon with ground meat and egg

Make another kimchi pancake.

Really ugly looking kimchi jeon

Make more soup.

Kimchi ramyeon with fried pork

Get a fusion inspiration and bring some good ‘ol fashioned American food to Korea. Make kimchi burgers with kimchi fries. Laugh at comments on Facebook that say how it would send most people straight to the toilet. Eat the meal and proceed straight to the toilet.

Kimchi burgers with kimchi fries

Wake up one morning and decide that maybe kimchi for breakfast isn’t the craziest idea. Make kimchi, pork belly, and egg sandwiches for a lazy Sunday morning in.

Kimchi breakfast sandwiches

Make more soup.

Kimchi ramyeon with fish, pork belly, and imitation crab

Get tired of soup and decide to experiment a bit more. Imagine that grilled cheese sandwiches taste good with tomatoes, and decide to substitute chopped kimchi instead. Create iteration one kimchi grilled cheese with cheddar cheese and kimchi.

Kimchi grilled cheese: iteration one (cheese and kimchi)

Decide that cheese and kimchi is a good combination, but meat is also a good addition to the classic grilled cheese. Recall having a grilled cheese with ham and tomato at one point in your life. Create iteration two kimchi grilled cheese with cheese, kimchi, and pork belly.

Kimchi grilled cheese: iteration two (cheese, kimchi, pork belly)

Enjoy the second iteration sandwich for a while until you don’t. Realize that nothing is ever made worse by adding a fried egg, and rethink your recipe. Create iteration three kimchi grilled cheese with cheese, kimchi, pork belly, and a fried egg. Continue to make iteration three sandwich over and over again, mastering the iteration three grilled cheese so you can add it to your arsenal of 100% reliable recipes to whip out for future potlucks.

Kimchi grilled cheese: iteration three – mastery (cheese, kimchi, pork belly, fried egg)

Finish the last of your five kilos of kimchi about six months into your stay in Korea and realize that it has become a staple in most of your home-cooked meals.

Order another five kilograms.