We ordered the Bo Ssam from Goldbelly and made it tonight. There are only a few meals where I can say that the food made my whole body happy. This was one of them. Such flavorful pork by itself and with the glaze. But it is really the thoughtful well composed sides that complimented that delicious pork. I expected to love the kimchi (and I did). However that ginger scallion relish was so good. Have never had anything like it.
The kit came packed in dry ice and included a cooked pork shoulder in plastic wrap along with kimchi, korean chili sauce and a ginger scallion sauce. This is what the pork looked like when it was unwrapped. We needed to wrap it in foil and let it completely dethaw. A temperature probe confirmed it was 32 degrees Farenheit.
These are all the sauces.
The roast then went in the over at 325 degrees and needed to reach an internal temperature of 165 degrees. Once that was reached, it was time to add the glaze which was molasses and soy based. This went on and the oven temperature was raised to 425. I needed to baste the roast several times which helped with the carmelazation. This is after the first glaze. I then removed the rack and the roast was so tender it just fell apart - which is exactly what you want to happen.
I then pulled the pork into medium sized pieces and moved to a platter. There was enough pork to easily feed six people. This is only about 25% of the pork.
Finally it was sandwich time!! We have pillowy soft potato rolls to serve it on. Both had the korean chili sauce. One has the kimchi and the other has the ginger scallion sauce.
The sauces by themselves tasted fine. But it was how they were able to elevate the pork which was amazing. The ginger scallion sauce didn't have an overpowering flavor of either ginger or scallion but you could taste both. And added to the pork and the chili sauce, it made your whole body happy. An example where the whole is much more than the sum of the parts. Each ingredient tasted fine on its own, but not that remarkable. But when combined together, that is when you really appreciated that thought behind the dish. When we go to a restaurant for a meal, we often focus on how much it would cost to make that meal at home. Not thinking about the skill, training and patience of the chef who managed to come up with the concept for the dish. Could you make something similar at home? Yes. But there are times when we just have to agree that a trained palate adds level of flavor that a home chef never can. I hope to be able to visit Momofuku some day. Until then, we will order this again from Goldbelly.
The package from Momofuku also included the ingredients to make fried rice for the next day. For that, you heated a pan, heated up the ginger scallion sauce and then coated the jasmine rice until warmed through. Then you added scrambled eggs. I added some green beans for color and also because having a vegetable seemed appropriate given all the meat we had been eating.
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