Seafood kimchi hotpot (kimchi jjigae)

Kimchi jjigae is a spicy Korean stew or hotpot dish made from either seafood or pork with kimchi, tofu and soybean and red hot pepper pastes (some food ingredients I lugged back from my recent trip to Seoul). I made this twice in a week. The first time, I made it using pork soup stock. The second time, which is for this recipe, I stewed it with prawns and scallops. Both yummy! It can be used as a soup base for steamboat or served with ramen. Even though it looks complicated, but it's actually super easy to prepare!

 

 

 

Ingredients:

• a pack of kimchi (about 200g) together with its juice
• about 5 cups of water or stock
• 2tbsp red hot pepper paste
• 2tbsp soybean paste
• 3 cloves garlic, minced
• 1 onion, sliced
• 1 Chinese cabbage, cleaned and cut into chunks
• 1/2 medium size carrot, sliced
• 1 potato, sliced
• 3-5 soft white tofu
• seafood eg prawns / scallops / octopus *I use a little amount of these to prepare the soup base in order to sweeten up the soup. The rest are only added in near the end of cooking time to ensure that they don't overcook.

Instructions:

1. In a pot or larger pan, stir fry garlic and onion till fragrant with vegetable oil.
2. Stir in prawns and scallop, followed by kimchi, carrot, potato and Chinese cabbage. Cover up for about 2-5min.
3. Add in water or stock, with soybean paste and red hot pepper paste.
4. Stew for about 30min to an hour. Last 10min before serving, add in the tofu, followed by the seafood.