뉴스레터

What is food to Korean people?

 There are numerous sayings about food in Korea. Translated into English, some of them would be “Everything goes better on a full stomach,” “Everything depends on the way you eat your mind,” “That rice with those vegetables,” “It will not become rice nor porridge,” “A ghost who dies after eating has color and charm,” and “Ashes on the cooked rice” There are numerous sayings about food in Korean. Joy, anger, sorrow, and pleasure are melted in food and Korean people ask you whether you have eaten when they say hello. Food culture is one of the most important key themes to understand Korean culture.

Global attention to Korean cuisine, China’s theory of Korean cultural origination from Chinese culture

 As people all over the world pay more attention to Korean culture, China’s theory of Korean cultural origination from their own culture is strengthened. Food is not an exception. It includes kimchi, ssam (a vegetable wrap with a piece of meat and other ingredients in it), and samgyetang (ginseng chicken soup). China’s largest web portal Baidu insists that kimchi and samgyetang originated from Sichuan pao cai and a Chinese Cantonese dish, respectively. However, they uploaded the photographs of Korean kimchi and samgyetang, instead of Chinese dishes. It seems like they confess that representative nature lies in Korea while persisting that kimchi and samgyetang originated from China.

Academic conference to seek out ways to resolve culture clashes

 On Fri, July 29, 2022, an academic conference was held at Northeast Asian History Foundation Conference Room under the theme of “The Anesthetic of Korean Food Culture and Historic Understanding of the Journey.” Eight Korean dishes (rice, kimchi, namul (Korean salad), samgyetang (ginseng chicken soup), meat, jang (Korean sauces and pastes), liquor, and ginseng) which are differentiated from food of the neighboring countries or received attention from the world were determined as the detailed topics of the academic conference in order to seek out ways to resolve the Korea-China food culture clashes and discuss the identity of Korean food culture.

Part 1. Controversial Foods: Fermented Food (Kimchi), Namul (Ssam), and Guk (Samgyetang)

 Park Chae-rin, chief research officer of World Institute of Kimchi, reviewed the features of Korean fermented foods through kimchi. China insists that kimchi originated from Sichuan pao cai. However, it is merely pickled vegetables which commonly exist all over the world. On the other hand, Korea’s kimchi is fermented food made from salted seafood and exclusive kimchi seasonings. She stated that kimchi is completely different from pao cai in that sense.

 Proffesor Jeong Hye-gyeong at Hoseo University mentioned the namul culture of Korean people who enjoy ssam vegetables (vegetable wraps). She said that Korean people eat around 1,000 different species of plants and it is difficult to find all over the world an ethnic group who eat such a variety of grass, roots, and leaves. It is no exaggeration to say that Korean people is the race of namul. China insists that Korea’s ssam culture came from China even though Chinese people generally stir-fry vegetables, instead of eating raw. Her presentation confirmed the diversity and the meaning thereof in the history of food for the lettuce ssam of Goryeo—which were particularly popular in the Yuan dynasty—and namul culture.

 Jeong Hui-jeong, chief research officer of the Center for Art Studies, Korea, mentioned that samgyetang was known incorrectly as a modern dish. The feature of samgyetang is that it consists of a whole chicken filled with a diversity of medicinal herbs. Samgyetang is very different in its recipe from a Chinese Cantonese dish that is made of chicken pieces boiled with ginseng. Furthermore, ginseng is not produced in Guangdong. Her presentation newly revealed that Korean people enjoyed chicken dishes during the Joseon dynasty and there was a chicken dish whose chicken shape was just like that of the dish during the early Joseon dynasty and that was filled with a variety of medicinal herbs.

Part 2. Korean Dining Table: Rice, Jang (Korean sauces and pastes), and Meat

 Jeong Yeon-sik, professor emeritus at Seoul Women’s University, talked about East Asian rice culture different from that of the West and Joseon’s rice culture with unique characteristics. Professor Jeong introduced a record written by a scholar of the Qing Dynasty stating that rice of Joseon is shiny, soft, and savory and rice cooked in a pot is cooked evenly and greasy.

 Park Yu-mi, instructor at Sangmyung University, showed Korean culture of jang, the basic condiments that decide the tastes of Korean foods, in chronological order. Jang (Korean sauces and pastes) is divided into fish sauces/pastes, meat sauces/pastes, and soybean sauces/pastes, etc. She mentioned that soybean sauces and pastes have been existing in the Korean peninsula since Gojoseon, showing archeological materials.

 Professor Cha Gyeong-hui at Jeonju University showed different types of meat Korean people ate in the past, Korean meat culture, and the chronological changes thereof. She made a very interesting presentation, showing a variety of image materials with the changes in Korean meat culture.

Part 3. Liquor and Medicinal Herbs

 Jeong Jeong-gi, researcher of Imwon Gyeongje Institute, talked about Korea’s liquor culture. I (Gu Do-yeong) dealt with ginseng, the medicinal herb of the Korean wave during the Joseon Dynasty. Ginseng was considered the elixir of life in East Asia and recognized as one of the best world-famous products. During the presentation, I talked about the development history of the Korean ginseng industry including the advancement of ginseng processing and cultivation technologies, the economic values, and the global status thereof.

 The academic conference was originally planned to seek out ways to resolve the Korea-China culture clashes resulting from China’s theory of Korean cultural origination from Chinese culture. It was also meaningful in the sense that the identity of Korean food culture was confirmed from a wide perspective of East Asia.