TED Talk (6 - Interview)

It's finally the end of this project...and honestly I feel some mixed feelings about this one. Like any other school assignment, it feels good this is over. On the other hand, this is the most fun I've ever had doing a school assignment, and that reflected on this presentation. I liked what I was talking about, I KNEW what I was talking about, and it was a nice way to present everything I learned about along the way. It's a bittersweet moment right now.

As for the presentation itself, I felt it went pretty well. I wish this worth some more points because I was proud and confident of the work I put out. It's okay since maybe I'll start putting this much effort into assignments worth more points. I got a shot at McDaniels (but I don't honestly think he's useless) and fulfilled my dream of using Gordon Ramsay quote in a project. It felt appropriate considering my topic.

If I were to grade myself, I would give myself an A. I felt prepared and felt good presenting, but there were some things I could have done better. I forgot some of my script and I stuttered a little bit, so I think that would constitute at least a point or two off. Here's a potential rubric:

Visual Component: 4.5/5

Content: 14/15

Organization: 4.5/5 

Delivery: 5/5

Total: 28/30

Although I made a couple friendly bets that I would get a perfect score, I don't really believe that's possible with how I did. If I hadn't made those small mistakes, I'm still not positive that I could have gotten perfect. That has to do with my content on the most part. 

I'm not really sure if my theme came across the way I wanted it. I left out a couple parts of my script because I was slightly nervous, and after the presentation, all I could think about were how those lines could have added some substance to my message.

With the visual component and organization, my presentation was a little boring and dull. I also had A LOT of trouble coming up with transitions from the points I wanted to make, so most of my effort was actually during my outline.

I'm still happy with the result regardless. This is actually (most likely) the first A I've ever gotten on a gifted project! And although I hate to admit it, this is also the most effort/time I've given to a gifted project. Damn my work ethic.

Even if I did manage to screw this presentation up somehow and get a B, I think is still the most I've ever taken from a school assignment. The process of cooking has just opened my eyes to something that I used to take for granted so often. I plan to cook for my family once in a while now, and I might even continue to update this blog.

To all my readers, all six of you, thanks for following my blog. You will never be forgotten. As for my gifted block, if you're reading this, I might bring in some amazing Korean BBQ if I get the chance after spring break. Just a way to match up to Kate Suchodolski who is endlessly bringing in food and making me look bad.

FOR THE LAST TIME (AT LEAST FOR NOW),

Bye from Anthony Leeonardo da Vinci

I'll miss you!

Bibimbap (5 - VLOG)

My Vlog

Hey guys! This week is my vlog, and it gives an overview of what happens once a week when I cook. This week was bibimbap, which is another spicy rice dish. This dish isn't actually very traditional since it was officially only made a century ago, but it is wildly popular. My dad's hometown Jeonju is known for their delicious version of the dish. Anyways, enjoy my cooking! (especially if you're in my block)

This Rice is Getting Fried (4 - INTERVIEW)

The day has finally come where I get to cook with Korea's most prized ingredient - KIMCHI! My blog would not survive without this food in the URL, and Koreans would not be able to live without this side sitting next to their rice at every meal.

Kimchi fried rice has the most versatility of any Korean food in my opinion. Drunk men can use it for their hangovers; college students usually find this a practical meal; moms use it to shut their hungry kids up within 10 minutes. Even in the cooking sense, kimchi fried rice can vary in almost any ingredient and still produce a delicious meal while still bringing out the flavor of the kimchi. 



Kimchi is a unique and traditional fermented ethnic food of Korea. It is made of various vegetables and fermented with a lactic acid bacteria. Mr. McDaniels actually knows how kimchi is made the traditional way, which is by putting it in the ground for as long as you want. This food the representation of Korean cuisine, being included at pretty much every meal and every home. The average Korean eats about 77 pounds of it ever year...



Here is the process of my kimchi fried rice: The first thing that we did was finely chop some scallions and a spicy green pepper. I don't know why, but scallions are literally part of every single Korean dish and it's starting to taste like grass to me. On a low heat, I put the pepper and scallion onto the pan to sit and brown nicely.





After that, it was time to get working with the kimchi. This is the most important part, because the way the kimchi is cut will affect the texture and the flavor. I like having the rice consistent, so having a large piece of kimchi just seems a little off. That's why I like to cut it into ridiculously small pieces, but it really just depends on what you want. After cutting that, I put it in with the vegetables.

The next important part is adding the kimchi juices to the pan. Doing this just adds more flavor in general, and is important to helping bind the rice together. If you don't add enough kimchi juice, the rice becomes bland and comes out in clumps. The next step isn't necessary, and talking to some people about the sample I brought in class it seemed to be a little spicy. Because I've been eating spicy food all my life, adding red pepper paste doesn't really make it spicy at all for me (I even held back just because I didn't want to make it too spicy for you guys). 

After that's all done, just stir it around for a couple minutes and you got a quick meal on your hands!

The next thing I would like to talk about is very exciting. I finally got an expert interview! Everything just lined up perfectly for this moment, so let me give some context. My dad invented a pan that takes away the smell of foods while cooking them, mainly meant for things like fish and especially KIMCHI. As delicious as it may be, it's honestly got a nasty smell. 

My dad went to go do a sales pitch for his invention in Seoul for a restaurant which translates into "Second Floor House." I got him to ask a couple questions, to the workers, so here it is! (This might not be accurate because my dad translated and he's not too good at English LOL)

Q: Why do you think kimchi has such a significant place in Korean culture?

A: I believe that this is the one thing that makes us unique. For thousands of years, we borrowed from the Chinese and Japanese, leaving us with nothing that we can call our own. My family took pride during the Japanese colonization of Korea in making kimchi, and that was one thing those soldiers didn't have.

(this question was more for my focus of this week, but I found this to be a really meaningful answer)

Q: Why do you think that cooking is a necessary skill?

A: Does anyone on this planet live without eating? I think your son back in America is still lucky to have his mom home, because can you cook yourself? Expert cooking is not required, but home cooking shouldn't just be limited to the women, because women aren't the only people on this world who eat.

Q: Do you have any advice for people that are out there trying to learn to cook?

A: Don't find any pressure trying to live up to anyone's expectations! If you like your own cooking, there is no reason for anyone else to make you change. They can learn to cook for themselves. There are a lot of people out there, and you can't satisfy the details of every single person. I can't even manage my own family's appetites! 

Q: What do you think is the biggest benefit of being able to cook on your own?

A: The first thing that it did for me was get my wife. The second thing it did was save money. The third thing it did for me was to not take food for granted and really appreciate what we can do with it.

This interview really opened my eyes to the cooking world. These past few weeks have been fun, but I feel as if I was missing the point. Of course it's great to be able to know how to make your favorite foods, but this interview really helped me understand that it goes further than that. 


To be completely honest, I expected some bleak, empty responses from these guys. The amount of pride that goes into their skill and even the ingredients they work with really shocked me when I first read the answers. Maybe we should all try to be like these guys, no matter what we do.

Next week, I will be making another famous Korean dish: BIBIMBAP 

(definitely the most fun dish to pronounce)

See ya next week!

Anthony~

Nothing Beats Thick Cake (3)

This week I feel like I had a major success! I made ddukguk (rice cake soup) which is one of my favorite Korean soups, and I think it turned out pretty well. The only time my mom had to help me was when she had to tell me the next step, but after that I kind of figured it out on my own. I also added my own twist to it by adding some other ingredients, but let's start from the beginning.

Ddukguk is a traditional Korean dish eaten during the celebration of the Korean New Year. It is tradition to eat this dish on New Year's because we believe it gives good luck and makes you a year older. You CANNOT become a year older until you eat this, and this is the only time you gain a year so your age doesn't become doubled.

The ingredients I started with were some peeled anchovies, dried kelp (which is larger and thicker than seaweed), two eggs, and a lot of rice cakes. Looking around the kitchen, I found some other leftover ingredients I thought would integrate well with the soup, which were chicken, soy sauce, and fish sauce. 









I got a large pot of water boiling and put the kelp along with the anchovies in there. These ingredients aren't meant to stay in the soup if you don't want, so I just let them sit in the water with the soy sauce and fish sauce and took them out about 20 minutes later. While that was going, I got the chicken pieces and started separating them into smaller strands so that they would heat evenly in the water. After the broth was ready and the soup ingredients were prepped, they were ready to get dumped into the pot. 

On another part of the stove, I got a pan ready to cook the eggs (uh oh). Eggs are supposed to be cooked separately from the soup because of the presentation of the dish. The broth tastes a little richer when the egg is just thrown into the water and mixed around, but it doesn't look appealing at all. LUCKILY, I didn't burn the eggs this time and got them cut into nice little strands. Seaweed and scallions are also cut into strands to put on top of the soup.




When the soup was finished, we poured it into three bowls and put the toppings on. It actually looked really nice, and I might even go as far to say that it would be comparable to a restaurant's! However, it seemed as though my brother didn't really appreciate what I made for him.

Anthony wondering why he's so naturally talented

Yeah, I don't know why he didn't like it. Also, there was another thing I learned this week. A lot of the time I'm spending in the kitchen is actually getting organized and cleaning up. I'd say the effort I'm putting into cleaning and cooking is 50/50. Every couple of minutes, I realized that there were so many things I had to throw out like scallion heads, egg shells, anchovy peels, chicken fat, and it just all kind of became overwhelming. I wish I had a picture of it but I guess I panicked in the moment and cleaned it all up as fast as I could. So word of advice when you're cooking, try to keep a trash can near you or check to see if there is trash because you don't want to be cleaning that all up at the end. You can have a picture of the dishes I had to do though:

Me complaining about the small amount of dishes

Next week, I will be making kimchi fried rice. This could be something I post an extra blog on, but it depends on if we make our own kimchi this week! I also might be able to bring this in for you guys to try, but like I said before, Korean food is best when it's hot so there might a slight problem.

^Delicious

See you next week!

Anthony

A Fat Roll (2)

Week 1 was supposed to be a warm-up week. This was supposed to be the week where I experienced Korean food in one of the most traditional and simplistic ways. Turns out, making kimbap (traditional Korean roll) is WAY harder than you might think. 

Initially, I thought, "All you really have to do is put everything in seaweed and roll it, right?" Then we got to blanching spinach, flipping eggs (which you guys already know I can't do), shaving cucumbers, and separating crab meat, all of which made me want to quit on the spot.

All the ingredients of my kimbap

(egg, cucumber, carrot, crab, pickled radish, spinach)

After I prepared all the ingredients, it was finally time to roll. I tried doing it on my own multiple times, and the part I thought would be easiest was also more complicated than it had at first seemed. On my first try, I rolled the bamboo mat along with it. I don't even remember what I did on my second try because it was just so mindblowingly stupid.

A picture before the rolling process and my failure

Finding out that I was still being an idiot, my mom had to step in again to show me how to roll it. Turns out you're supposed to roll it once with the bamboo mat and then continue with your hands. Afterwards, you wrap the whole thing in the mat and squeeze it all together so nothing falls out.

I needed a lot more practice, so I made about 10 rolls (which is A LOT) until I could make it look aesthetically perfect. Roll after roll, the quality got slightly better and my mom finally approved of what I was putting out.

Finally getting to cut some sexy pieces

I now know the reason why my mom hates making this for us. I always thought that it was easy which is why I picked it as my warm-up, but I truly believe that this will be towards the top in terms of difficulty. Even for my mom, it takes her an hour to make enough for 3 people. No matter how tedious this process is, I would still like to make it because of just how nice the final product is in taste and presentation. 

Hopefully, next week will be better than this week. This is another traditional Korean food that I enjoy, and it is ddukguk. Here is what it will look like:

Anyways, see ya next time!

Anthony~

Welcome To My Genius Project! (1)

Hey! This blog will be dedicated to the journey that I, Anthony Lee, will be taking on my mastery to Korean food. Currently, I would say that my cooking skill is around a 10/10. Here is an example of a fried egg that I made a couple weeks ago.

SIKE you thought I actually knew how to cook. Well, the problem is I don't. Not one bit. And the real problem is when my parents will leave in April for their 25th anniversary, leaving me alone with my older brother who also doesn't know how to cook. We both know how to use the microwave and make ramen noodles, but I'm not trying to get 50 health problems because I can't cook some simple, healthy meals.

That's why I've taken it upon myself to learn how to make 5 Korean meals, limiting myself to only one microwavable meal and one ramen for the week that my parents are gone.

Just so you know to expect from these blogs, here is a timeline that I set myself, listing all the foods I'll be making.

Week 1: Basic Kitchen Tools and Food Prep Skills

Week 2: Kimbap (seaweed rice roll)

Week 3: Ddukguk (rice cake soup)

Week 4: Kimchi Fried Rice

Week 5: Bibimbap (Spicy mixed rice)

Week 6: Galbi (beef short rib)

Week 7: TED TALK PRESENTATION

The Final Goal

Hopefully, by the end of this experience I will be able to cook for my family at least once a week because these are pretty common foods that we eat. I think the biggest goal, however, is to not burn the simplest of foods.