Sha Bang's Kitchen: Kimchi Fried Rice with SPAM

A dear colleague and friend of mine is about to go out on maternity leave. She ever so sweetly asked me to post a how to for kimchi fried rice.

So Jo Ann, this is for you...

There are 4 ingredients to making this bad boy.

The culprits are:

about 2-3 cups of Kimchi
3-4 slices of Spam
4 cups of Rice
1 tablespoon of Seasame Oil

I used:

C'mon. The label says less fat, sodium and calories. It's right on the label!

Normally, I buy this brand of kimchi,

But the last time I was at the market, I decided to buy a smaller jar and bought this one:

The best kimchi hands down, is the one made by my mother. But since I didn't have any of my mom's kimchi on hand, like any good Korean American girl, I drove to my nearest Korean market and bought some. Look. In theory, I know how to make kimchee. I've seen my mother do it thousands of times. She's explained it to me a hundred and four times. She's made me help her a make kimchi before too. But there's this....unscientific science to kimchi and I just know that my kimchi won't taste right. Let's get real. Where am I going to find the time to buy napa cabbage, slice napa cabbage, soak in salted water over night, and all that jazz?

The other tip to kimchi is this. There are different degrees of fermentation. There's new, new kimchee that's literally just freshly seasoned after removing from salted water- my pop loves it this way. Me? Not so much. I like mine old. Like old, old so that's it's kinda of zingy and nicely pickled. You'll find people prefer their kimchi anywhere along that scale from new to old. I like the richer more developed flavor of older kimchee. In fact, you'll find that kimchee fried rice and kimchee chigae (stewed kimchee) tastes better with older more fermented kimchi.

So when you run out to buy your kimchi, chances are you'll find it is on the newer, less fermented side, Just let it sit in your fridge for a few days. If you're in a rush, just leave it out over night in your sink. It will ripen up quickly. The warmer the weather, the faster kimchi will ripen. Also, be aware that as kimchi ripens and ferments, it can OVER FLOW out of the jar. So keep it in your sink or make sure you have paper towels under the jar if it's in your fridge.

For this recipe, I used about 2 and half cups of kimchi. I'm guess-timating because I usually just eyeball it and let my stomach tell me how much to make. If you make this enough, you'll get the feel for what ratio of kimchi to rice you like.

On medium to medium high heat, add kimchi into your frying pan or skillet. Of course, I'm using my cast iron skillet. I adore mine.

You can just leave the kimchi the size it comes out of the jar, but I like mine smaller and more bite-sized. I used to use a knife and cutting board, but I hated getting the kimchi juice everywhere as I was chopping it. Plus it stained my cutting board this orange color that was super hard to get off. So what's a girl to do? Cue the kitchen scissors! Yes! I use kitchen scissors to cut up my kimchi directly in the skillet. Genius! No mess and no fuss. Boom!

After using the scissors to cut up the kimchi into smaller pieces, it looks like this:

To this, add one tablespoon of sesame oil. I use this kind:

If you aren't familiar with sesame oil, it has a really strong, rich flavor. I don't use it for cooking food. I use it to flavor food. The point here is to get the sesame flavor into your kimchi fried rice.

Now. Onto a topic that is near and dear to my heart. Spam. Some people love it (Me! Me! Me!). Some people hate it (Boo! Boo! Boo!). If your don't like it, don't use it. You can use ham or ground beef, ground pork, or even leave out meat altogether (Trader Joe's has a frozen vegetarian kimchi fried rice). But for me, I love mine with spam. It's how my ma made it for me and it brings back great childhood memories. I have a friend who once made her mom fry up chopped up spam to add into the meatless kimchi fried rice she had made for her. (HAHAHA! Kitty! You know it was you!)

I grew up eating spam and I remember my grandmother talking about how precious spam was to them during the Korean War. In fact, there's something in Korean cuisine called 부대찌개 (budae chigae) or translated it's called Army Base Stew and it has hot dogs and spam in it. It's a part of my culture and I don't have a problem with it. If you have a hard time with it, then feel free to leave it out. More for meeeeeee!

I used regular flavor spam (they have all kinds didn't ya know?) but whenever possible, I use Spam Lite. For this recipe, I used three slices (okay...I might have decided it could use more spam and added another slice as I was cooking. Shrug.)

First, I cut into three slices about this thick:

Then I cubed them. Feel free to cut them into whatever size you like. I like them on the smaller side so that each bite is not too salty.

Add chopped spam into your skillet with the cooking kimchi

Saute kimchi and spam until kimchi becomes translucent.

See the difference between the piece on the right and the smaller one on the left?

The one on the right is more cooked than the other piece and turning translucent.

If the kimchi is starting to stick to the pan, you can add a little bit of water like I did here. Just a dribble.

I would estimate it was about a tablespoon or two of water.

Now it's time to add rice! Because rice is so nice. I've used cooked quinoa in place of rice before. It's a good substitute if you're avoiding rice. But there's just something about rice.

(I should mention I use short grain brown rice.)

I added two heaping scoopfuls (I would guess it was about 4 cups of rice). I used freshly cooked rice, but you can use cold rice. If you use cold rice, add a little more water, add cold rice, spread evenly over the kimchi, cover with a lid and let the rice steam a bit. I would suggest you add rice as you go. If you add too much rice, then you'll end up with bland kimchi fried rice. So start with a scoop and add as you go.

Mix the rice into your kimchee and spam mixture. Keep stirring to prevent rice from sticking or burning to the pan.

I like to turn the heat down to low and spread my kimchi fried rice evenly in the pan. The bottom will become nice and crispy. Or if I'm hungry, I'll just shovel it into my face as soon as it's done.