Soups & Stews

After banchan, soups (guk) and stews (jjigae) are the most Korean things of all—they are what we really eat on a day-to-day basis. We use the words jjim and tang for these things as well: They once had specific meanings, but now they blur together. A meal of rice and soup or rice and stew for a Korean is like a sandwich is to an American. These dishes can be both homey, as in what you fix for yourself for dinner, or celebratory, as in the thing you order at a fancy restaurant and share for a special occasion. Koreans love them, and they crave them, and I think it’s one thing that sets Korea’s cuisine apart from the cooking of Japan or China.