Bulgogi Marinade - Simple, Quick & Deeelicious!
Today, I’m excited to share with you a viral “bulgogi” marinade from Korea. It was featured on a hit celebrity TV show called “Youn’s Kitchen”.
The concept of the show was to take a few Korean celebrities and have them open a pop-up restaurant in a foreign country.
The viewers could see the dynamics between the celebrities in a kitchen setting as well as the reaction of foreigners trying Korean food for the first time.
On one of the seasons, they featured “Mother Bulgogi”. The featured a special marinade that could be poured directly into the frying pan, along with thin slices of beef.
The bulgogi was cooked in less than 15 minutes! Making it a very efficient recipe for serving fresh-to-order.
It grabbed my attention and I thought it would be perfect for the everyday working family – just pour in the sauce with thin slices of fresh beef.
And voila - a delicious bulgogi dinner!
So we gave it a shot … and we were so impressed with the overall taste!
Good enough for us to share with you – but we did make a few minor tweaks to the ingredient amount (reducing the sugar level and few others to get the flavor more balanced!)
The best part about this mother bulgogi marinade is that it’s made with ingredients that you can easily find at any grocery mart.
Apples (as opposed to Korean Pear), onions, garlic - nothing hard to find.
If you’ve never tried making Korean Bulgoogi at home, I don’t think you’ll find an easier recipe!
Cooking Notes for Bulgogi Marinade:
After the bulgogi is made, serve it with Rice or use it in a sandwich!
If you can’t find thin cuts of beef at your market – simply buy a cut of ribeye, place it in the freezer for 1.5-2 hours (to firm it up - but not fully frozen), then slice it thinly with a sharp knife.
The bulgogi marinade will stay fresh for up to 1.5-2 weeks.
Note: If you want the bulgogi beef to be more tender, let the beef slices soak in the mother marinade overnight!
Alright, I hope you enjoyed this simple recipe ya’ll. If you end up with a successful bulgogi night at your house, tag us on IG.
We enjoy flipping through your pics as we wake up in the morning heh!
Daniel out! 🕺
(P.s. If you’re cooking alone, don’t get bored. Consider listening to our latest podcast episode while you cook!)
Ingredients
Fresh Ingredients
- 400-500 grams Thinly Sliced Beef (Ribeye works well)
- ½ whole Onion
- 1 stalk Spring Onion (length of your forearm)
- Small piece Carrot (length of your pinky)
Mother Bulgogi Marinade
- ½ whole Apple (or ½ Korean Pear)
- ½ whole Onion
- ¾ cup Soy Sauce
- ¾ cup Water
- ⅓ cup Sugar
- 2 Tablespoons Minced Garlic
- 8-10 crack Black Pepper
Instructions
Prep Fresh Beef & Ingredients
- Cut a piece of Ribeye Steak (or Tip Sirloin) into thin pieces. (Note: You can place in the freezer for 2.5-3 hours to make it easier to cut into thin slices). Wrap the thin slices in a few paper towels and pat it down. The paper towels will get rid of the excess liquid and residual blood from the meat.
- Cut a small piece of Carrot (pinky-length) and julienne into thin pieces. Then Julienne ½ a whole Onion. Next, split 1 forearm-length piece of Spring Onion stalk in half. Then stack the layers and cut into small, finger-length pieces.
- Note: If there are any other ingredients you would like to add to your Bulgogi (like mushrooms), feel free to julienne them and set aside for cooking. We'll move onto the marinade now.
- Now, back to the meat slices. Peel off the paper towels. Set it aside for now.
Make Mother Bulgogi Marinade
- Peel and core an apple. We'll use ½ of a whole apple - dice the half into smaller chunks to make it easy to blend. Same for the onion - peel it and dice ½ of a whole onion into smaller chunks.
- Take out a blender. Place in diced apples (½ a whole), diced onions (½ a whole), Soy Sauce (¾ cup), Water (¾ cup), Sugar (⅓ cup), Minced Garlic (2 Tablespoons), Black Pepper (8-10 cracks). Then give it a good thorough blend.
- Place the marinade through a sieve and into a bowl. The sieve will catch the foam. Give it a few minutes for the liquid in the foam to seep through into the bowl. The resulting liquid in the bowl may still have some foam on top - use a spoon to skim it off (you don't need to get everything off).
- Now it's ready for use!
Cook Bulgogi
- Place a small amount of vegetable oil into your frying pan. Once its hot, add in the spring onion pieces. Stir-fry that around for 15-20 seconds.
- Then add in the onions and carrot slices. Stir-fry around for 15-20 seconds.
- Use a pair of tongs (or chopsticks) to add the meat into the pan. Try to separate the pieces so that they don't clump together.
- Then immediately add in 2 soup ladles of the Mother Marinade Sauce. (If it tastes bland, you can add an additional ½ soup ladle later).
- Let it boil away in the marinade until the onions turn soft.
- Once the onions are soft, the bulgogi is ready! Give it a final taste and plate 🙂
Choose Rice or Sandwich!
- Serve with rice - and place some salad greens on the side. Drizzle some of the residual broth over the rice. Bon Appetit!
- For Sandwich: Sprinkle some shredded cheese over the bulgogi and let it melt. Toast your sandwich bread (we loved using Banh Mi Bread - so good!) Spread some Mayonnaise and Sriracha Sauce on the bread, then add-on the cheesy bulgogi, along with a small handful of lettuce and cilantro. Finish off with another drizzle of Sriracha. Bon Appetit ya'll!
D says
I just made this with ground beef and my whole family, including two picky 8 year olds, inhaled it!
Jin says
This blew me away.
A few months back I made this recipe and I never had bulgogi before but oh my, this just made my whole week.
Now I am planning what to cook next week and noticed that this recipe surely will come up regularly.
Your korean take on Shabu Shabu is amazing as well!
Greetings from Germany and have a great 2021.