Ahnest Kitchen Is Preserving a Labor of Love

What was the inspiration for starting Ahnest Kitchen and what was the process like in the early days? 

The whole purpose of starting Ahnest Kitchen was that I didn’t feel like there were people like my mom—who have all this knowledge and who are a bit older—represented online. There are a lot of amazing cooks who don’t do it for a living because they’re just busy trying to survive life. They understand what it means to make lemonade out of lemons.

How did Ahnest Kitchen evolve into your cookbook, Umma?

As it evolved and became more professional, and these recipes were being developed for a cookbook, it made me realize the importance of preserving these recipes. Because a lot of people who are of the younger generation aren’t cooking as much. 

I didn’t want to write a book where it was coming from me, someone who would make modern recipes, fusion recipes, things that are adapted to the American lifestyle. I needed this book to traditionally preserve the recipes that have been passed to my mom, which is one of the last generations to learn from people who cooked out of pain, memory, and survival. It became more than just a passion project. It felt like something I was destined to do.

How did your relationship to one another and to Korean food and heritage change while writing the cookbook and developing recipes? 

I had initially collected these recipes for myself. When I finished the book, I realized making food for us was my mom’s expression of love. And I realized there’s so much work that goes into making Korean food. It is a labor of love. I can’t just collect the recipes for myself and call it a day. I need to make these same recipes she made for me and our family and give that back to her and feed her those recipes. And so, I made all these laborious foods for her, like seafood soup and kimchi and different fermented foods. 

Your mom is one of your cooking heroes, but do you have any cookbook author mentors or cooking heroes who you look up to?

It's the everyday people who inspire me. It’s the abuela that’s your next-door neighbor, the Italian family that has the best meatball recipe, the mom-and-pop shops that have a line out the door in a plaza that's run down. It's those people that I always want to befriend and talk to. 

I owe a lot of inspiration to fellow James Beard Award winner® Randy Lau of Made with Lau. He was documenting his Cantonese father's recipes; I thought it was fascinating that an 80-year-old former chef was being recognized.  

We love that Umma includes a whole chapter devoted to banchan. Can you tell us more about its significance in Korean cooking and dining traditions? 

Banchan are small side dishes that accompany your meal. Kimchi is considered banchan, but because kimchi is such a significant part of our identity and cuisine, it has its own section [in the book]. There are usually different types of banchan in different colors; some are fermented, some are pickled, some are plant-based, and some are protein-based. 

What do you wish more people knew about banchan, whether it’s making them at home or dining out at a Korean restaurant?

It’s such a beautiful representation of Korean food, because banchan are not always the simplest recipes—sometimes it’s just as much [labor] as making the main dish. Next time you're at a table that's serving Korean food, notice the way that they placed the banchan, the way the colors are patterned, and how the same colors are not directly adjacent to each other. Notice the way that they deliberately place the pickled banchan next to the plant banchan that's not pickled. It's very intentional; I think that's very beautiful, because presentation matters a lot too.

As you write in the book, one of your favorite banchan is Dubu Jorim, or Spicy Braised Tofu. What makes it so special?

It combines the balance of Korean flavors—sweet, spicy, tangy, umami—with plush tofu. Tofu and soybeans are a huge part of Korean cuisine, and it highlights tofu’s abilities with Korean flavors in a very simple, yet delicious way. It uses plum extract syrup, which is a pivotal ingredient in Korean food because that’s what we used before we had sugar, and it has this multi-dimensional sweetness that sugar alone can’t give. Gochugaru [Korean red chili pepper flakes] is what makes it spicy; you can adjust it to what you can tolerate. 

Does Nam Soon have any tips or techniques for getting the texture of the tofu right? 

Within our book, there are all these tips that didn’t quite make it into the instructions. When it comes to cooking tofu, don't focus on making it so crispy. The secret is to not overcook it and to focus on maintaining the structural integrity of the tofu, which is keeping it plush. When you bite into dubu jorim, it’s just barely crispy on the outside—it’s golden-brown. When you bite into this plush, cottony, buttery tofu that’s coated in this spicy yet sweet, nuanced sauce—it's unbelievable.