How to make Colm O'Gorman's delicious Ssamjang chicken parcels

Colm O'Gorman's Ssamjang chilcken parcels.

This week’s recipe works beautifully as a light fresh lunch or supper and comes together in about thirty minutes. Perfect for a day after the main Christmas festivities when everyone is craving something light and fresh.

As regular readers will know, I am a huge fan of Korean food. The range and depth of flavours and textures are amazing, and it is quite easy to prepare once you have a few staple ingredients to hand. 

For this week’s recipe you will need Korean Soybean paste, Korean red pepper powder (also known as Gochugaru), and some Gochujang, my all-time favourite chilli sauce. You will find all of those in any good Asian supermarket.

In Korean cuisine Ssam are delicious little parcels of food, usually grilled meat wrapped in lettuce or other leaves, topped with a few tasty garnishes and some Ssamjang, a beautiful mildly spiced Korean savoury paste. ‘SSam’ translates as parcels, and ‘jang’ are fermented soybean-based sauces and pastes.

Included in this recipe are Korean Pickled Onions. These require a little bit of advance planning as they need a day to pickle. They are fabulous, but if you have not been able to prepare them in advance, you can swap them for some pickled pink onions which are much quicker to prepare.

To make pickled pink onions, peel and very thinly slice two red onions. Heat 150ml of white wine vinegar, 100ml of water, 75g of caster sugar and a generous pinch of sea salt in a saucepan until the sugar has dissolved. Pour the pickling liquid over the sliced onions and let them pickle for a short while you prepare the rest of the dish.

Delicious Ssamjang chicken parcels

recipe by:Colm O'Gorman

This week’s recipe works beautifully as a light fresh lunch or supper and comes together in about thirty minutes. Perfect for a day after the main Christmas festivities when everyone is craving something light and fresh.

Servings

4

Preparation Time

 15 mins

Cooking Time

 15 mins

Total Time

 30 mins

Course

 Main

Ingredients

• Korean Pickled Onions

• 500g onions

• 4-5 fresh chillies, a mix of green and red

• 250ml water

• 250ml good quality soy sauce

• 250 ml apple cider vinegar or rice wine vinegar

• 200g caster sugar

• Red Pepper Chicken

• 500g chicken mini fillets

• 1 tsp Korean red pepper powder

• 1 tsp garlic granules

• 1tsp onion granules

• 1 tbsp toasted sesame oil

• 1 tbsp soy sauce

• Ssamjang

• 80g Korean soybean paste

• 2 tbsp gochujang

• 2 tbsp toasted sesame oil

• 1tsp honey

• 1 clove garlic

• ½ a small onion

• 20g flaked almonds

• ½ apple

• To Serve

• 1 head kos lettuce

• 1 tsp toasted sesame seeds

• Thinly sliced red chilli

• Chopped spring onion

Method

1. As mentioned earlier, the pickled onions need to be prepared at least a day in advance of when you want to eat them, but they are fabulous, and worth the little effort it takes to make them. They are sweet, sour, salty and savoury, with a little kick of chilli. They are fabulous with any grilled meat or as a side whenever you fancy a pickle.

2. Peel and roughly chop the onions, cut them into chunks of about 1cm. Wash and thinly slice the chillies. Make the picking liquid. Combine the water, soy sauce, vinegar and sugar in a saucepan and bring to the boil over a medium heat, stirring it often, until the sugar dissolves.

3. Sterilise a few large jars, you will want about one litre in total volume for this quantity of pickled onions. Simply wash the jars in hot soapy water, dry them thoroughly and pop them on a baking tray and into an oven at 180 Celsius for ten minutes. While the jars are in the oven, place the lids in a pan of boiling water and boil for the same amount of time.

4. Combine the chopped onions and sliced chillies and then divide them across the sterilised jars.

5. Pour the pickling liquid over the onions and close the lid. Leave at room temperature for about three hours and then refrigerate. The onions will be ready to eat in 24 hours but will taste even better after a few days. These pickled onions will keep in the fridge in sealed jars for two to three months.

6. To make the chicken for your ssam, combine the mini fillets, red pepper powder, garlic and onion granules, sesame oil and soy sauce in a bowl. Stir to coat the chicken. Arrange the chicken in a single layer in the basket of your air fryer and cook at 180 Celsius until the chicken is cooked through, about ten minutes will do it. Turn the chicken once halfway through the cooking time.

7. If you do not have an air fryer, you can cook the chicken in a nonstick frying pan over a medium heat instead. Simply add the chicken to the pan once it is hot, and fry for five minutes. Turn and give it another five minutes on the other side.

8. While the chicken is cooking, pop all the ingredients for the ssamjang into a food processor and blitz until smooth. Set aside until you are ready to serve

9. Wash about a dozen leaves of lettuce from a head of cos or romaine lettuce and cut them into thirds. Deseed and thinly slice a few red chillies. Wash and finely chop four to five spring onions.

10. When the chicken is cooked, place it in warm serving bowl and scatter over a teaspoon of toasted sesame seeds. Garnish with a little red chilli and some chopped spring onion.

11. I like to serve this meal on a large platter. I arrange the bowl of red pepper chicken, some smaller bowls with the Ssamjang, pickled onions, chopped spring onions and sliced red chilli and the lettuce on the platter and serve it up so that everyone can make their own lettuce parcels.

12. To eat, spread some ssmajang on a piece of lettuce, add some chicken, pickled onion, chilli and spring onion and wrap it into parcel. These should be eaten in one bite, Korean style!