Major Milestones and a Bulgogi Recipe

Today is the lull between two major milestones. Yesterday was Joseph's 12th birthday, and tomorrow, my daughter, Sian, who has been in Ukraine for the last 18 months serving a mission, comes home.

On Saturday last week, I was stressing about getting Sian's bedroom ready for her. Elannah had painted three of the walls a lovely periwinkle blue but ran out of steam before she managed to clean and paint the final wall. Plus, she had taken off to an amusement park with her friends for the day. I was really excited because I had finally finished all my work assignments and had a few days' break before getting more, so now I had time to sort out the room and no reason to have to sit in front of my computer all day.

I went downstairs to the basement and had a look around the crowded little room. It was overwhelming. Gabrielle had left most of her things behind when she moved out, and the bed and the dresser had been taken apart and stacked in the middle of the room so Elannah could paint. There were boxes and bags full of things everywhere. The desk, too, was covered in the detritus of Gabrielle's high school career, along with some of Sian's old things.

My  phone rang, and it was my brother, Aaron. Could he come and spend a few nights at our house? For some reason, he hasn't been able to shake this cold/congestion thing that he's been suffering from for months, and now some of his limbs are starting to swell. The doctor told him he has allergies and prescribed him a pill for it, but it's done nothing. Maybe it's something in his house, and if he sleeps better at our house, that would be a good indicator that there's something going on.

I enthusiastically told him to come right over as soon as he liked. He's so much fun to have around, and my kids adore him. Plus, though he was perfectly willing to sleep on the couch, it gave me great motivation to get Sian's room done that day so he could sleep in it for a few nights.

It took me all day, but I got it done. All of Gabrielle's old things have been boxed so she can sort through them when she comes here to stay tonight in anticipation of the whole family picking up Sian from the airport tomorrow. The final wall has been painted, the floor is scrubbed--along with the bed frame and the dresser and the desk--and the trash bags and the old carpet remnant used as an area rug have all been hauled out to the garbage cans. Sophia spent some time helping me, as well, which was a great way for us to have a little conversation about life and whatnot. By 8pm, the room was ready: sparkling clean and freshly blue.

Aaron said he had a pretty good night after the congestion finally lifted. We'll see if he continues to improve. He took off for work before I saw him this morning, so I didn't get a chance to ask him how last night went.

Yesterday, Sunday, we had my parents, grandmother, and one of my sisters over to celebrate Joseph's 12th birthday (my in-laws are currently out of town). I was sore and exhausted after getting that room finished, but I faced a long afternoon of food prep for Joseph's birthday dinner. Joseph requested his favorite food, which is bulgogi, Korean marinated beef. I didn't know if I had the budget to make enough bulgogi to serve as a main entree for 11 people, so I decided to make bibimbap. Bibimbap is a very flavorful dish. For each serving, the base is sushi rice that has been steamed and then fried so that it has a crisp coating. Small amounts of various side dishes go on top of the rice: the bulgogi, matchstick carrots cooked in a soy glaze, glazed mushrooms, green onion slaw, flavored quick-fried mung-bean sprouts, garlicky-soy spinach, wakame (seaweed), sauteed zucchini, and a fried egg. It's delicious. Here's a bibimbap recipe. (I used a different bulgogi recipe for the meat because I like it better.)

As you can imagine, it takes hours to prep and cook all the components of bibimbap, which is why it's more of a celebration dish than everyday fare. It's great for when you have tons of people to help you out in the kitchen (and the kitchen space for those people, which is not something I have, alas). It was a huge success, and Joseph loved it. That's what counts.

You could also make bulgogi and serve it with steamed or fried rice and just one of the bibimbap side dishes, which is what I usually do. I particularly love the carrots, mushrooms, and zucchini. Any of those would be an excellent single accompaniment to the meat.

Here's the bulgogi recipe that I really like. Once you have the meat sliced (you can even ask the butcher to thinly slice a roast for you to save even more time), it's mostly just letting it marinate before broiling or grilling it right before serving. If you want to spend even less money on the meat, choose chuck roast or any other tough cut on sale and tenderize it with baking soda before marinating.

Bulgogi

4 pounds London broil (top round) roast, cut into 1/8" or 1/16" slices (to ensure that the meat will be fork-tender, lightly sprinkle both sides of the slices with baking soda, let sit for 10-15 minutes, and then rinse and pat dry before continuing)
1 large onion, skinned and cut into quarters
1 head garlic, peeled
1 cup soy sauce
1 medium green pepper, seeds removed
1/2 cup sesame seeds
1/2 cup brown sugar
2 tsp black pepper
1/4 tsp red pepper
1/2 cup sesame oil

Put all the ingredients except the meat and the sesame seeds into a blender or food processor and puree.

Toast sesame seeds in a metal pan and mix them into the marinade.

Put the meat into the marinating dish and pour the marinade over it. Mix the meat and marinade with your hands so that all surfaces are completely covered. Cover dish with cling wrap and let sit in the fridge for at least 2 hours (overnight is better).

Grill marinated meat strips on BBQ or lay them on cookie sheets before broiling them in the oven. It only needs a couple minutes per side.

Chop or mince leftover bulgogi and add it to fried rice, scrambled eggs, or soup; or mix with some cornstarch before deep frying into crispy beef. Or just eat it cold for breakfast. Yum.