Ingredients · Spice
Gochugaru
Capsicum annuum · Solanaceae (nightshade family)
What it’s like, and how to use it
How to use it
Coarse flakes for kimchi — it is the whole colour and much of the flavour. In gochujang, tteokbokki, kimchi jjigae, sundubu, bibimbap sauce and Korean fried chicken. In a marinade for short ribs. It is mild enough to use by the spoonful where cayenne would be used by the pinch.
With food
Napa cabbage and radish. Pork and beef. Anchovy and fish sauce. Garlic and ginger. Sesame. Tofu. Rice. Spring onion.
With spices
Garlic, ginger and sesame. Black pepper. Doenjang and soy, though those are pastes rather than spices.
With tea
Roasted barley tea or hojicha alongside a Korean meal — something toasty rather than floral.
Its story
Where it comes from
Traditionally made from sun-dried Korean red chiles. Whether ours is grown in Korea or made Korean-style elsewhere is unconfirmed. Worth knowing about this one: a quarter of the searches that find it name Calgary or Edmonton — people are looking for it close to home, not looking up Korea.
What happened
The chile is American, and it reached Korea by way of Japan around 1600. Yi Su-gwang's encyclopedia Jibong yuseol, published in 1614, holds the first Korean mention of it, recorded as having come from Japan and called waegaeja — Japanese mustard. In 1768 the Veritable Records of the Joseon Dynasty have the aged King Yeongjo saying that with four flavours — pine mushroom, fresh abalone, young pheasant and gochujang — he eats his meals well. Which means kimchi is far older than the red kimchi anyone pictures: the 1670 cookbook Eumsik dimibang, with around 146 recipes, never mentions the chile at all, and napa cabbage only reached Korea at the end of the nineteenth century. Red peppers also had a life outside the kitchen — strung with charcoal on a left-twisted straw rope and hung over the gate to announce the birth of a son, and tied round soy-sauce jars to keep off the spirits that were thought to spoil the taste. Gimjang, the late-autumn making and sharing of kimchi, has been on UNESCO's intangible heritage list since 2013.
On the shelf with it
Sold on its own, and in these blends.
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Sold outGochugaru (Korean Chile Flakes)
Regular price From $8.99 CADRegular price
