Bacon-Fat Kimchi Jeon with Herbs

As long as you have kimchi in the house, a meal can be made. Case in point: kimchi jeon, pancakes made primarily from chopped kimchi, kimchi juice, and a little flour. While jeon is often considered a party food, kimchi jeon has always been an everyday staple in our family. These versions seem fancy with the pressed-in parsley and bacon fat, but they’re actually pretty quick to throw together and taste wonderful with white rice. You could dip these in soy sauce and rice vinegar; that’s what we normally would do. But I’ve come to appreciate with equal fervor a midnight snack of cold kimchi jeon slathered with sour cream and dill.

Unbalanced

% Daily Values based on a 2,000 calorie diet

Step 1

1.Make the dipping sauce: In a small dish, stir together the soy sauce, vinegar, sesame seeds, gochugaru, and scallion. Set aside.

Step 2

2.Make the jeon: Add the bacon and olive oil to a cold large nonstick skillet. Set the pan over medium-high heat and fry the bacon, stirring occasionally, until crispy on all sides, 3 to 4 minutes. Remove the bacon with a slotted spoon to a plate lined with paper towels. Transfer the bacon fat to a small dish, leaving 1 tablespoon in the pan to fry the first batch of jeon.

Step 3

3. Meanwhile, in a medium bowl, stir together the kimchi, kimchi juice, ½ cup water, the egg, gochugaru, flour, sugar, salt, and scallions.

Step 4

4. Heat the pan with the bacon fat over high heat. Ladle about ¼ cup of the batter into the hot fat. You should be able to fit 2 to 3 jeon in the pan at a time. As they fry on the first side, neatly lay the parsley on top and press down slightly so the leaves stick. Sprinkle some of the reserved cooked bacon on top. Fry until lightly browned and crispy, about 2 minutes per side, then transfer the jeon to a large platter while you cook the rest of the batter, adding more bacon fat to the pan between batches.

Step 5

5. These are best eaten as soon as they come off the heat. Serve with the dipping sauce.