The fall/winter season has come with a vengeance right now, after a very warm early fall.  It’s cold and dreary and rainy outside and I happen to love this kind of weather. 

It’s also the perfect weather to work out at Jung Suwon.  It’s not so hot that you sweat just changing your clothes.  In fact you’ll need to work hard to stay warm! 

I have found that soup is perfect for this time of year.  But in addition, if you are not a good cook yet, and you are struggling with your culinary development, start with soup. Trust me, they are easy to make, it’s easy to be creative with soups, and it’s easy to impress people with your soup cooking.

For example, spicy Korean soups are my current favorites to make and eat.  They are healthy, filling, but not fattening perfect foods and so easy to make.  A perfect soup base would be some chicken soup as in the recipe earlier on this blog.  Or the oxtail soup I mentioned.  But, if you don’t happen to have that on hand, or just don’t want to bother, no problem!

Grandmaster Tae Yun Kim explained to me that during the Korean War times soup was always a great thing to make – whatever you had, you put into the soup and were able to feed several people for what otherwise would have been just one ingredient for one person! 

So, here are some basics for some good soup.  Let’s assume you don’t have any broth ready.   Boil some water with ground or chopped garlic (and in my opinion there is no such thing as too much garlic).  If you have some leftover potroast, add a couple of slices, or if you have some leftover broiled chicken, you could add that.  Add whatever vegetables you have on hand and boil.  Add salt and pepper to taste and if you like it spicy like I do, add some red pepper flakes.  You could also add some kimchi to this.

As to what to put into the soup, the sky is the limit.  Try some noodles – either the very thin Japanese noodles (boil them seperately), or Korean glass noodles, or whatever size and shape noodle you like.  Or, add some suchebi, or some ready made mandoo.  Or add a few of each.  You can also drop some eggs into the soup. 

Ok ok, I better stop – I believe this will keep you busy for a while.  But do go ahead and give soup a chance!