Budae Jigae (the holy grail)- Eat it at breakfast, lunch, dinner or whatever!!

1/4 Pound Raw Ground Beef

For 4 people but can be managed with 3 very hungry ones!

1 Twelve Ounce Can Spam or Spam Light Sliced

1 Twelve or Fourteen Ounce Can of Baked Beans

1 Large Sausage or 2 Hot Dogs (or be like me, use both!)

1/2 Large White Sliced Onion

1 Pack Of Ramyun Noodles or Uh-Dong Noodles

1/3 Head of Sliced Cabbage or Half That Amount of Kimchi

2 Stems of Scallions Sliced

1 Tablespoon Minced Garlic

1 Cup Bean Sprouts

1 Whole Shitake Mushroom Sliced

1 Very Hot Red Pepper Sliced

Water (beef broth would be ideal, Koreans will boil bones and meat to make a kind of beef broth for this, but we just use normal water)

1 1/4 Cup Rice Cakes (see picture below)

Oh yeah! THIS is it! This is the holy grail of Korean food. Some Koreans don't even know this food, and I can't believe it. Literally, Budae Jigae means 'Army Stew'. From what I have heard, the origins of this come from the Korean war. The Koreans would salvage what food they could from the Americans and try to make some sort of soup. What they always found in abundance were hot dogs (or sausage), spam, baked beans and ground beef. Sounds like a winner already and we haven't even started. This also has the typical Korean spices for a great soup: scallions, hot sauce, ramyun noodles, garlic, etc. I tried to make sure that I got many pictures for this one! EVERY American that I ever introduced this to developed some strange addiction that only more Budae Jigae could cure! Man, my mouth is watering!! Let's get cooking!

1 Tablespoon Red Pepper Paste

1 Tablespoon Ground Red Pepper

First things first. It's best to prepare everything that must be washed and sliced and make sure that you have easy access too it all. This is our layout. We used the Cabbage instead of the Kimchi.

SOME INGREDIENTS THAT WE USED

Here are the Rice Cakes, they're sliced (Korean name is 'TTAK')

This is the Sausage that we used, we used only 1/2 the pack and sliced it.

This is the Red Pepper Paste.

Before you even heat the pot, make sure that you do your preparations (wash vegetables and slice everything). First, take the Ground Beef and put it in a bowl. Grind up with your hands and mix in a dash of Salt and Pepper. Mix well. In a giant bowl add the following: Ground Beef Mixture, Sliced Spam, Baked Beans, Sliced Onion, Cabbage, Mushroom, Hot Red Pepper, Bean Sprouts and Sausage or Hot Dogs (whichever you chose). Here's a picture of it all sitting in the cooking pot on the left. Now you have to add some water (or beef broth) to just cover everything, but not too much where it is boiling over the pot, you still have to add some more ingredients. This should be boiled for about 10 minutes on highest setting before adding the mixture below, so maybe make the mixture before. Ranie makes the mixture rather quickly, so it's not a problem.

Our Baked Beans and Garlic. You can see the pot that we use. It's very heavy duty and was bough in Korea. Great investment!

Salt and Pepper

In a separate bowl, you now want to add the Red Pepper Paste, the Minced Garlic, Ground Red Pepper and the Salt (about a dash of salt, my wife lost patience when I asked her how much because she just pus in whatever). Mix it very well. Here's a picture of that mixture, although it looks like a bad picture. I had a problem taking this shot!

After the it has been boiling for 10 minutes, add the Sauce that you just made, the Scallions and the Rice Cakes. Here's a picture of that process. Let it boil another 10 minutes on high. 2 minutes before taking if off of the stovetop and eating, add 1 pack of Shin Ramyun (there is a picture of that on the Tom Myun page). Don't add the mixtures, just add the noodles, they are the best for this but make sure that you don't boil for too long or they will become sticky and gummy. We didn't add the noodles to this one, but I highly recommend it!!

Now feel free to indulge and enjoy! Make sure that you have some great sticky rice hot and fresh waiting at the table (it will make you full!). Whenever I get home and I know that there will soon be some Budae Jigae on the table, I know that it's going to be a good day!