Colm O'Gorman: Brighten dark January days with my beautiful Bulgogi Beef recipe

Bulgogi Beef is a beautiful Korean barbecue dish, but it can be easily cooked on a griddle or in a skillet.

The holidays are over, and most of us are back to work, or school or whatever our everyday usually is. As is often the case at this time of year, the airways, papers, and social media are littered with content about New Year’s resolutions, fitness goals and worst of all in my view, detox diets. Do not get me wrong, I do not begrudge anyone whatever works for them to get their year off to a good start, or a focus to get through what can be a bit of a miserable month, but I am always at a loss to understand why that often seems to involve making it even more miserable by denying themselves comfort and pleasure. If there was ever a month to eat comforting, warm and satisfying food, then January is most definitely it. After all the rich food and indulgence of the holidays, an adjustment may well be needed, but there is no need to make long, dark January days even more miserable than they need to be.

Of course, as with most things, there is a middle ground. In January I generally like to change things up a bit and introduce some new dishes to my diet or resurface old favourites that I have not eaten for a while. I go for freshly cooked dishes with lots of flavour, avoiding over processed foods, and using fresh ingredients. I most definitely go for comfort, food that warms the heart as much as it feeds the body.