Pod Insights The Sporkful Soju, Snacks, And Ramen: How To Party Like A Korean About this episode This week’s show is a raucous Korean-style night out, all on a weekday afternoon. Dan heads to Orion Bar in Brooklyn to learn how to drink like a Korean with Irene Yoo and Peter Kim. Irene is the owner of Orion Bar and author of Soju Party, a book of drink and food recipes that’s also a guide to Korean drinking culture.
Transcript Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.
0:00 Dan Pashman? My whole extended family and I went to Myrtle Beach, South Carolina this past spring. And I gotta say, I came away feeling like, number one, this is a great family destination. Number two, this is a great place to come all year round. The mini golf alone is probably worth, it's like the mini golf capital of the country. They have the most incredible elaborate mini golf courses. They also have more than 80 championship, full-size golf courses, plus 60 miles of beautiful coastline, all-season sunshine. Of course, you can relax by the beach or the pool. There's also jet skiing, fishing charters, paddle boarding, and of course, food. Oh, man, did we eat well in Myrtle Beach. From fresh local seafood to craft burgers and craft beers to kebabs on the boardwalk. With more than 2,000 restaurants to choose from, from legendary no-frill seafood shacks
0:43 Dan Pashman? to chef-driven dining, Myrtle Beach has it all. Plus, live entertainment at the beach, there's always something epic going on. So, summer may be winding down, but in Myrtle Beach, you're gonna find the coastal vacation of your dreams all year long. Start planning your ultimate beach vacation at visitmyrtlebeach.com.
1:00 Speaker 01 A lot of people think fire is for cooking. Well, that's technically correct. At Teriyaki Madness, we think of it as flavor. Every char mark is a tiny black belt of awesomeness. There's a method to our madness at Teriyaki Madness.
1:18 Speaker 02 Sirius XM Podcasts.
1:28 Speaker 03 My parents used to have soju in like juice boxes. They came in like little boxes. And I was such a dumbass in high school. I, just to be brash, I brought those boxes into school and I'll drink them in class because nobody could actually tell what they were.
1:43 Dan Pashman? These are my friends, Peter, Kim, and Irene Yu. We're all hanging out at Irene's Bar in Brooklyn. And you were drinking soju in school.
1:51 Speaker 03 Only as like a way to show off to my friends.
1:53 Speaker 04 I hope you were eight when you did.
1:59 Dan Pashman? This is the Sporkful. It's not for foodies, it's for eaters. I'm Dan Pashman. Each week on our show, we obsess about food to learn more about people. Even though I have a lot of friends in the food world, it's pretty rare that two of my friends publish books on the exact same day and that the two books complement each other perfectly. But that's what's happening this week. And when a great episode falls in your lap, you go with it. So let's do this. Irene, you spent years running the pop-up You Eating, bringing her take on Korean-American comfort food all around New York City. Now she's got a new book out this week called Soju Party: How to Drink and Eat Like a Korean. It's a collection of recipes for drinks and foods to pair with them.
2:41 Dan Pashman? And it's also a guide to the traditions and customs around Korean drinking culture. So on a Wednesday afternoon, we decided to meet up at Irene's Bar in Brooklyn, Orion Bar. We were also joined by Peter Kim. His first cookbook, also out this week, is called Instant Ramen Kitchen. It takes instant ramen in all kinds of new directions, using ingredients from all over the world. Peter promised to whip up a few of the dishes for us.
3:05 Speaker 03 Over the years, when I make instant ramen, it's not like I'm aiming at a particular dish, per se. It's like totally freestyled. It's actually hard to think of something that won't work in instant ramen.
3:15 Dan Pashman? In Korea, ramen is a classic food to eat after drinking. That's where the perfect complement part of this episode comes in. So here's the plan. We'll drink and snack with Irene, then have ramen with Peter. It's basically a Korean-style night out, all on a weekday afternoon. But before the party can start, Peter heads off to the kitchen at Orion Bar to prep all the different ingredients for the ramen dishes he has planned. Meanwhile, I have some questions for Irene. She grew up in the US but spent most of her summers in Seoul, so she's seen drinking culture from both sides. How is it different in Korea versus the US?
3:48 Speaker 04 So anytime I'm in Korea for like a few weeks, and I've been drinking every single night there, and I come here and I have one night of drinking, I'm like taken out. So that's the thing like people really need to understand, that it's like a different kind of drinking.
4:00 Dan Pashman? That's partly because Korean drinking culture involves a lot of snacking throughout the evening, which helps you pace yourself.
4:06 Speaker 04 My favorite was the dried fish. You see this in a lot of other cultures too, where it's like the dried pressed fish, like a fish jerky. That's so good with beer. And also things like tan, which is like a Korean pancake.
4:21 Dan Pashman? There's even a food for the next day called hangover soup. In Irene's cookbook, it has beef chuck and beef broth, doenjang, gochujaru, and soybean sprouts. Other recipes include coagulated pork blood. Korean drinking is also different because soju, the most popular alcohol in Korea, is very different from hard liquor.
4:38 Speaker 04 So it seems like people are drinking a lot, which they are, but soju is so much lower in alcohol. Shooting soju is so much different than shooting whiskey.
4:47 Dan Pashman? Soju is a distilled spirit traditionally made from rice. It's clear with a smooth taste and slightly sweet finish. Sometimes compared to vodka with less of a burn. There are also fruit flavored soju's. Koreans typically do shots of it. But as Irene said, soju's alcohol content is much less than spirits like vodka and whiskey, less than half of those liquors. Its strength is actually about the same as wine. Soju drinking comes with many of its own customs. For one, you never pour your own drink.
5:13 Speaker 04 In Korean culture, there's so much of this idea of needing to respect your elders. And so there is a hierarchy of who starts eating, who's served first. And that is the most apparent in Korean drinking.
5:26 Dan Pashman? In family settings, others pour for the grandparents first. Then the parents get theirs, then down the line from there. If it's a social setting where people don't know each other so well, everyone might share the year they were born to establish the order. You also see this sort of hierarchy of drinking when coworkers go out together. Office culture in Korea is very much tied up with drinking. But Irene says in that case, the hierarchy is less about age and more about position in the company.
5:51 Speaker 04 You would sort of like the owner, the CEO of the company first, and then the VP, and then sort of go down the line. But then when it hits sort of your turn, instead of pouring for yourself, someone has to pour for you.
6:04 Dan Pashman? And that's the way it is throughout. And then there's also this idea that sort of like everyone has to keep pace with the boss.
6:09 Speaker 04 Mm hmm. Yeah, there are rules where you can never say no to the first drink that someone offers you. You generally can never say no to any drink that someone older or more senior than you offers you, which is a very slippery slope.
6:24 Dan Pashman? But so one of the things you say in the book is that it's like, on one hand, this is a pretty universal work culture rule, like, don't get too sloppy at the work drinks. That's one of the rules. But then the other rule is you're not supposed to turn down too many drinks.
6:37 Speaker 04 Yeah.
6:38 Dan Pashman? So how do you, those two things seem like they could be in conflict with each other.
6:41 Speaker 04 In Korean culture, it's a little bit of, I mean, obviously you don't want to do something really bad, but there's less of a taboo around like, oh, you can't get sloppy. Because obviously we're here to get drunk. There's sort of an expectation that you drink until you are unable to stand up.
6:56 Dan Pashman? I think some people are gonna hear that and be like, this sounds like a lot of fun a lot of times, but like, that approach to drinking night after night, week after week, like, does that ever worry you that that it could also create problems for people?
7:09 Speaker 04 Oh, of course. And that's something that a lot of people who don't drink as much, or just society in general, has that we're seeing a lot more of. And especially like Gen Z, or in Korea, they call it like MZ. The younger generations are sort of pushing back against that. They're feeling less obligated to follow that or trying to steer things away from just like the hard drinking culture.
7:35 Dan Pashman? How much of these different rules are part of like your own approach to drinking today?
7:40 Speaker 04 I would say I like to follow them more as like a loose, fun rule rather than a hard, fast, like, requirement. It's also a bit like boomer to be like, oh, I'm older than you, you gotta pour for me.
7:56 Dan Pashman? So Korean drinking culture is evolving. Still, Irene thinks some part of these rituals are important to preserve.
8:02 Speaker 04 It's very much about like you're sitting at a table, you're sharing food, you're sharing a bottle, you're sharing everything, you're taking care of each other. And then my favorite part is that like the more you get drunk, the more sort of your walls come down. So this is like when I hear all about like the crazy like family stories. Or just like a lot of the pent of feelings that like your family or your friends have that they might not feel comfortable sharing like sober. And of course that happens in American culture too. But I think Korean drinking has such a structure when it starts that you really see those like walls break down as you go.
8:45 Dan Pashman? Well, Irene, since we're at your bar, can we have a Korean drinking party here?
8:49 Speaker 04 Let's do it.
8:52 Dan Pashman? All right, Irene, we got a bottle of soju here. What is a soju tornado?
8:57 Speaker 04 So the soju tornado is you whip it and you're basically making the liquid become a vortex. And it's a thing that Koreans do to like shake up the soju. It doesn't really do much, it's just a really cool trick.
9:12 Dan Pashman? It's a good party trick.
9:13 Speaker 04 Exactly.
9:13 Dan Pashman? All right, so so show me how it's done.
9:15 Speaker 04 All right, so the way you want to do it is you want to hit three o'clock, nine o'clock, and then 12 o'clock.
9:21 Dan Pashman? A bottle of soju is a little bigger than a bottle of beer, so you can easily hold it in one hand. To make this tornado, you hold it straight up, then quickly snap it to one side, then to the other, then back to straight up and down.
9:32 Speaker 04 Like a hard snap at 12 o'clock.
9:34 Dan Pashman? If you do it right, the soju swirls inside the bottle like a tornado. This feels to me like flipping an omelet without a spatula. It's like you gotta do it with conviction.
9:42 Speaker 04 Exactly.
9:43 Dan Pashman? No hesitation, no doubt, you just have to like act like you mean it.
9:48 Speaker 04 You kind of want to go like boom, boom, boom.
9:50 Dan Pashman? Okay.
9:56 Dan Pashman? I just knocked a glass of water across the bar. But we don't need to talk about that. It's not as if we were just making a video, which will be on Instagram. All right, ready? Try it again, try it again. Here we go, ready?
10:07 Speaker 04 There you go.
10:07 Dan Pashman? Oh, look at that, it's tornadoing. We got tornado. Yes, I will post a video on my Instagram of my attempts at a soju tornado. Anyway, once the bottle's open, the drinking games begin. First up, twist cap. Soju bottles have a metal cap that you twist off. You know how twist caps have that extra ring around the bottom that sometimes stays on and sometimes falls off? So with the soju cap, you want to keep that metal ring just barely hanging on in one spot, and then twist it up so it's like a stick. Then you take turns flicking it. Whoever flicks it off the cap wins. Everyone else drinks. It's a game best played in a group.
10:43 Speaker 03 Hey, what's going on?
10:44 Dan Pashman? Our old friend Peter Kim is joining us. Hello, Peter.
10:46 Speaker 03 Hey.
10:46 Dan Pashman? Peter was done in the kitchen, so he came out to see what we were up to. Peter's also Korean-American, so he knew exactly what was going on.
10:53 Speaker 03 I see you're playing the cap-flicking game.
10:56 Dan Pashman? Have you played the cap-flicking game?
10:57 Speaker 03 I'm too sober to play this game.
11:00 Dan Pashman? Here, you hold the mic, Irene, I'm gonna flick.
11:04 Dan Pashman? Oh, I flicked that pretty hard.
11:05 Speaker 03 That was a pretty good one.
11:06 Dan Pashman? Yeah.
11:07 Speaker 03 Channel your rage through your finger.
11:12 Speaker 04 Koreans hold all their power in their fingers.
11:15 Speaker 03 Here we go.
11:16 Dan Pashman? All right, let's see.
11:16 Speaker 03 All those times I couldn't make my parents happy.
11:22 Dan Pashman? Oh, all right. I think you really cheated up for me now. This thing's hanging by a thread.
11:26 Speaker 03 All right, here I go.
11:29 Dan Pashman? Oh, man.
11:30 Speaker 04 I know, we think we're so close.
11:31 Speaker 03 I know.
11:32 Speaker 04 I feel like we're so close.
11:34 Dan Pashman? Oh, Irene wins, all right.
11:38 Speaker 04 All right, I'll pour for us then.
11:39 Dan Pashman? Okay. We're having some soju here, Irene. How do you, uh, how do you pick a good soju?
11:44 Speaker 04 Um, you just pick your favorite. They all taste the same, let's be real. I like Ginro's Back, which is the blue bottle. I'll have Peter pour for me so that we can observe our, um, our drinking rituals.
11:59 Dan Pashman? Even though Irene won, she figured she'd still do a shot with us. Let's go.
12:03 Speaker 03 All right.
12:03 Speaker 04 Oh, cheers.
12:04 Speaker 03 Cheers.
12:08 Dan Pashman? Mmm, that's really good.
12:10 Speaker 04 Right? So smooth.
12:12 Dan Pashman? Peter, what are your favorite memories of doing shots of Soju?
12:16 Speaker 03 Well, for me, it's just like super festive. You know, I really associate it with having a lot of friends together around a table and having barbecue. And usually I'll have everybody make their first, like sam, like their little lettuce wrap. And I'll lambast my like non-Korean friends for just like screwing it up. And then we all hold our first like sam together and then we'll toast and then, and do it. And then, you know, depending on how like up for like the party people are, you can do a shot with like pretty much every bite.
12:50 Dan Pashman? Now it was time to move on from Soju and try some of the specialty cocktails Irene serves at her bar. The first one looks like an orange slush. She calls it Space Spam.
12:59 Speaker 04 It is inside a plastic Spam can.
13:03 Dan Pashman? So it's not, it's not actually a can of Spam?
13:05 Speaker 04 It is not actually a can of Spam, though people do sometimes ask that.
13:09 Dan Pashman? I was gonna say, where does all the Spam go?
13:11 Speaker 04 Yeah, we do, we do have served Spam at the bar, so it could happen. But no, we have these plastic Spam drink cans. The Spam drink is inspired by me wanting to make a cocktail for Spam. It's sort of loved and enjoyed in a lot of like island countries, places like Hawaii, the Philippines, obviously Korea. So I was like, okay, let's do like a tiki drink. Koreans love ham and pineapple pizza. So I was like, okay, cool. So let's like do the pineapple. And then, but what's like, what makes Spam Spam? It's a little bit smoky, it's a little bit like spiced. So it has like a kocho karu rice syrup. So the kocho karu gives a little bit of heat.
13:53 Speaker 04 The rice syrup gives a little bit of maltiness, which I think is what makes it sort of like Spam-y. And then there's a little bit of smoke as well. That's the key.
14:03 Dan Pashman? So nice. Now normally I don't like more than a couple sips of a frozen drink. They're often so sweet and so heavy, but this one isn't too sweet. And the spice cuts right through any heaviness. I could easily see myself down on the whole thing. Not now, though, because it's time for one of Irene's bar snacks.
14:19 Speaker 04 So this is our soy sauce jalapeno pickles. Um, so it has like soy sauce, garlic, rice vinegar, cucumbers and jalapenos. And a little bit of lemon peel, like salty, it's a little bit sweet, a little less spicy than kimchi. Um, really good with beer and so do you and spam cocktails.
14:42 Dan Pashman? All right, should we try a bite?
14:43 Speaker 03 I want to get into it.
14:46 Speaker 03 Oh, my God.
14:49 Speaker 03 I really love the citrus almond to it.
14:51 Dan Pashman? Mmm. Mm-hmm.
14:54 Dan Pashman? This is like an adventure. Yeah. In my mouth. Mm-hmm. It's like the first hit is sweet. Yeah. And then it's a little bit pickly and then it's a little bit spicy.
15:04 Dan Pashman? Coming up, Irene heads to the kitchen to make us more snacks and I talked to Peter about his worldwide travel and how that inspired a book about instant ramen. Then we eat more and drink more, but we end up on the floor like a group of Korean coworkers on the town. Only one way to find out. Stick around.
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18:42 Dan Pashman? Welcome back to The Sporkful. I'm Dan Pashman. And if you are enjoying this episode, then I hope you will come hang out with Peter, Kim, and me in New York tomorrow night, September 9th, at an event celebrating the launch of his book, Instant Ramen Kitchen. We will be at You and Me Books at 7:00 PM, again, tomorrow, September 9th, and there will be snacks. I'll be interviewing Peter, he'll be signing books, it's gonna be great. Get tickets for the event at you, that's Y-U-and-me-books.com. I'll post all the info on the events page at sporkful.com, so I hope to see you there. Now, let's get back to the show and return to our Korean drinking party at Orion Bar in Brooklyn. Irene was in the kitchen making our next snack, so Peter and I sat down to chat. Peter's parents came from Korea separately.
19:26 Dan Pashman? They met in the US and settled in downstate Illinois, closer to Indianapolis than Chicago. Peter's a real Renaissance man, a world traveler with a wide range of interests and professions. But he wasn't always this way.
19:38 Speaker 03 I grew up really in this sort of like, in a way, a sheltered existence in the Midwest, where I had no thought about going outside the US or exploring other cultures. And when I went to college, I realized how little I'd seen of the world. And so I decided I really needed to dive into it, and the best way I could imagine was to do the Peace Corps. And I applied, and I said I wanted to go to Francophone Africa, and they assigned me to Cameroon.
20:03 Dan Pashman? Why Francophone Africa?
20:04 Speaker 03 I wanted to learn French.
20:06 Dan Pashman? And you did?
20:07 Speaker 03 Yes, yeah, yeah. Je parle français.
20:09 Dan Pashman? Voici le deuxième fois dans une semaine que j'avais raison de parler français.
20:16 Speaker 03 Uh, Dan, you should speak with English. By the way, I do a very good and probably horribly offensive French man.
20:24 Dan Pashman? Was it adjacent to the Peace Corps that you spent several years abroad, traveling all over?
20:32 Speaker 03 Yeah.
20:33 Dan Pashman? Ethiopia, Jordan, Romania, Spain?
20:36 Speaker 03 All over. And I think this is one of the things that really informed my worldview and my perspective on food, which is just being able to have the good fortune of being able to travel a lot, live in a lot of different, interesting places, and dive into the food culture wherever I went.
20:49 Dan Pashman? Peter came back to the US in his late twenties, went to law school, and started practicing law in New York. During that time, he also enrolled at the French Culinary Institute, which he did on the side while working full-time at a law firm. But for Peter, that still wasn't enough to keep him busy.
21:03 Speaker 03 Also studying flamenco guitar at the same time. So I was doing flamenco guitar and studying French culinary technique.
21:09 Dan Pashman? At the same time you were practicing law?
21:10 Speaker 03 Yeah, that's right.
21:11 Dan Pashman? Okay. Eventually, Peter left law to launch New York's Museum of Food and Drink. After that, he hosted a podcast called Counter Jan that explored cultures through food and music. The list of his projects go on. But now, he's got a new one, The Infinite Table.
21:25 Speaker 03 Yes.
21:26 Dan Pashman? This just launched.
21:27 Speaker 03 That's right.
21:27 Dan Pashman? This past summer.
21:28 Speaker 03 Yep.
21:29 Dan Pashman? I so badly wanted to go to the first event. It didn't work in my schedule, but I can't wait to go. But tell people what this is.
21:34 Speaker 03 So it's a new company I'm starting, and it brings together 360 video storytelling and food to really transport you. And one way I would put it is, imagine if you could go into like a chef's table episode and actually be immersed in the visuals. And as the story unfolds, you're tasting the food that they're presenting to the camera.
21:52 Dan Pashman? So like, in my head, what I'm picturing is that you're like, you're sitting at a long table with other people, and there are screens all around you.
21:59 Speaker 03 That's right. And so, one story we told was of this woman who's preserving this indigenous Zapaté tradition of making mole negro. And so, she talked the whole, through the whole story of how the recipe's been passed through her family. You watch her go through the incredibly intense process of preparing the mole negro. And then, she holds it up to the camera in this green terracotta bowl. And then, at the same time, a green terracotta bowl with actually her mole in it, which I brought back from Oaxaca, comes down in front of you. You can actually taste it. There were literally people crying when they tasted it because the whole buildup of the story and everything just gave it so much meaning. And so that's what we're trying to do is really build up what you're about to eat through the story, understanding the process, understanding the culture, the history, the passion that
22:44 Speaker 03 goes into it, and then you can actually taste it. And it's, I have to say, like, it worked out really well. It's quite magical.
22:49 Dan Pashman? I can't wait to check it out. And as we sit here today, you're a week away from packing your bags for Kerala and Madagascar.
22:56 Speaker 03 Yeah, that's right. So I'm going to be looking to find wedding caterers. I'm going to tell a story about wedding caterer in Kerala and all the, what that they do to prepare for a wedding. And then we're going to film a wedding in 360. So you're in an Indian wedding in Kerala, tasting the food that this caterer has made. And then I'm going to Madagascar and I'm going deep into the cacao forest there. And I want to tell a story of cacao production, how it's actually helping reforest Madagascar, and get people to understand everything that goes into developing the flavor of this incredible product that we know. But I don't know that everybody really understands everything that goes into making chocolate.
23:29 Dan Pashman? Now Peter's written a cookbook that brings together storytelling and travel with one food he loves in particular, instant ramen. I asked him to read from the book's introduction.
23:40 Speaker 03 Many cookbooks start with romantic childhood memories. You know, grandma's made from scratch dumplings, fresh fruit plucked from the family garden, the intoxicating aromas wafting out of the stock pot, and so on. Nope, not this book.
23:56 Speaker 03 Most of my childhood food memories wafted out of the microwave. My parents were immigrant entrepreneurs who hustled day and night to sell birthday cards and gifts at our family Hallmark store. They cooked when they could, but more often than not, I was on my own for dinner. On those evenings, I'd pop a Kid Cuisine frozen dinner, Dinty Moore beef stew, or Hot Pocket in the microwave, and dig in while watching TV. To this day, canned beef stew over white rice is one of my comfort foods. One dish stood out, though, because it actually got me cooking: instant ramen. Even though I was otherwise useless in the kitchen, I knew how to heat a pot of water, drop in the noodle cake and seasoning sashay, wait a few minutes, and then pour the whole mess into a big bowl.
24:38 Dan Pashman? Do you remember the first time you had instant ramen?
24:40 Speaker 03 I do. I must have been like eight or nine years old. My mom made me a Sapporo Ichiban, original flavor. And I think maybe just swirled an egg in and it blew my mind. It was so good, yeah.
24:54 Dan Pashman? You say in the book that your discovery of instant ramen led you into a sort of a a new phase of life, an era of culinary experimentation.
25:03 Speaker 03 Yeah.
25:04 Dan Pashman? What are some of the things that you remember?
25:07 Speaker 03 It started with eggs and scallions and then, you know, things like hot dogs. And then maybe like leftovers. And then it basically expanded into just general experimentation where I thought of every pot of instant ramen I'd make was an opportunity to just like try something new. And I would say it really planted the seed for me of just like starting to cook. And I started cooking at a really young age, so probably like around when I was 10, I was starting to cook a lot. Again, I was home alone a lot and so.
25:35 Dan Pashman? Right around the same age you started bringing soju to school.
25:40 Speaker 03 Drunk cooking at East Coast, come on.
25:43 Dan Pashman? In Peter's new cookbook, he taps into that inner ramen mad scientist that he was as a kid. The book is called Instant Ramen Kitchen. It does have some traditional recipes, but most are his own creations based on cuisines around the world. There's a borscht ramen, a shakshuka ramen, even a bacon, egg and cheese ramen. One of the things you talk about in the book which struck me, I mean, certainly, obviously, I knew that instant ramen was a big part of various Asian cultures and very popular in America. I didn't realize quite how worldwide it is.
26:12 Speaker 03 So, yeah, it's a staple in a lot of countries. So, India, you have Maggi noodles. And across the entire country, people love making dishes with Maggi. Across Indonesia, all around Southeast Asia, but even outside of Asia, you know, you go into Africa and in Nigeria, there's a brand of Indonesian noodles called Indomie that is so popular in Nigeria that if you just use the word Indomie, it's synonymous with noodles. In Brazil, they eat a lot of instant ramen. In Mexico, they eat a ton of maruchan. So there's, there's an instant ramen culture that's really global. And so it's not just necessarily an East Asian thing.
26:50 Dan Pashman? With pasta, people make a big deal of cooking time and al dente and all that.
26:54 Speaker 03 Yeah.
26:55 Dan Pashman? How important is that with instant ramen?
26:57 Speaker 03 I think it's really important, you know, I mean, texture is important for flavor. One thing that I point out in the book is that the instructions you find on most instant ramen packages leads to a noodle that's pretty soft for my taste. And so I have like a noodle cookery chart and I generally suggest that people cook their noodles a minute less than what's on the package, not only because it gets the right texture, but you also have to take into account the fact that these are noodles that are sitting in soup generally. And so for the time it takes for you to top it and then take it to the table, it's going to soften more.
27:29 Dan Pashman? As I said earlier, Peter's whipping up a few recipes from his book. So once again, he and Irene switched places. He went into the kitchen to finish cooking and Irene came back with another drink and some more food. So Irene, what have we got here?
27:43 Speaker 04 So this is our cheesy spicy takbokki. It is a pretty classic spicy takbokki, which is like a stir fried rice cakes with kochujang, kochukkaro. I like mine with fish cakes. This one's a little special because it's topped with mozzarella cheese.
27:58 Dan Pashman? Takbokki has been a key dish in Korean cuisine for centuries. We told that story in our Deep Dish series with Sola and Ham Al Weili. But in yet another example of how food never stops evolving, it's become popular in Korea to top takbokki with mozzarella cheese. But Irene takes that addition to the next level.
28:15 Speaker 04 It's bruleed a little bit and then topped, finished with a little bit of lemon juice.
28:19 Dan Pashman? Ooh, that's a nice touch.
28:20 Speaker 04 Yeah, and you'll see why. The smoky and the acid really work well together. And then we have our jujube ginseng negroni. It's made with a jujube infused soju. So one of the great things about soju is since it's like a pretty clear flavorless spirit, it takes to infusions really well. So I have a chapter in my book all about different kinds of infusions. That's a very traditional Korean thing. And then that we do with a little bit of a rice wash. We just like shake it with some uncooked rice, which is sort of a fun little cocktail trick to give like a really smooth texture. And a little bit of ginseng tea is in it as well.
28:59 Dan Pashman? Oh, I can't wait. I tried a sip of the drink first. Oh, man.
29:05 Dan Pashman? Oh, there's a lot going on here. I don't know that I've ever had a drink that was like, that felt so strong and so sweet at the same time.
29:16 Speaker 04 Yeah.
29:16 Dan Pashman? You know, like, like normally, it's normally, I feel like every drink exists on a spectrum.
29:22 Speaker 04 Of like bitter to sweet.
29:23 Dan Pashman? Right, right, like strongest alcohol flavor to sweetest. And you've like bent the spectrum. It's like a circle now.
29:31 Speaker 04 I like that. It's a Mobius strip.
29:33 Dan Pashman? Yes, exactly. All right, all right. Let's try some takbokki. Oh, I'm losing the cheese. Mmm.
29:41 Dan Pashman? That is so good. And the brulee on the cheese is a master stroke. Cause it gives it more like pizza vibes. Is this something that specifically would be like paired with drinking? Or this is just something that's delicious all the time?
29:56 Speaker 04 Takbokki is a dish that's like really kid friendly. Um, I like to sort of equate it as like the Korean version of mac and cheese. If mac and cheese was like spicy and made you sweat a lot. So yeah, kids grow up eating it, but that is, I think is the fun nexus of a lot of really good drinking food. It's something that makes you feel kind of comforted, a little nostalgic. Uh, so a lot of kid food in Korea can also double as drinking food.
30:26 Dan Pashman? I love it. And um, I just, there's such a unique texture to, to it that um, I don't, I don't know if there's anything else quite like it that has that, that it's a very specific kind of chewiness.
30:37 Speaker 04 Yeah, chewy is a really underrated texture.
30:39 Dan Pashman? Yes. Thank you, Irene. Preach.
30:45 Dan Pashman? I love crisp and crunch, but there's those, those can be so loud and overpowering that people underestimate the importance of chewiness. This, you know, takbokki is something you can really sink your teeth into. It's so satisfying.
30:57 Speaker 04 Yeah, I absolutely agree. But doesn't it kind of make you want like a little soju again?
31:03 Dan Pashman? Yes.
31:03 Speaker 04 The spice, you like wanna like clean it with the spice?
31:05 Dan Pashman? I just took, and I just took, yes, I just took another drink. This is the kind of thing where I feel like I could just like sit here all afternoon.
31:12 Speaker 04 And just go back and forth.
31:13 Dan Pashman? Right, just be like, oh, I think I'll have some pickles, oh, I think I'll have some soju, oh, I think I'll have some duck booky, oh, wait, let me get a cocktail, oh, wait, you know, like...
31:19 Speaker 04 Yeah, and now I'm drunk enough, I'm gonna get a bottle of soju. And now I'm hungry again, because I drank too much, so I need to balance that out.
31:25 Dan Pashman? Yeah, yeah.
31:25 Speaker 04 That's the essence of Korean drinking, you got it.
31:27 Dan Pashman? I got it, alright.
31:29 Speaker 04 Done, check. Shots, food.
31:32 Dan Pashman? Alright, mission accomplished.
31:36 Dan Pashman? There is one more part of the journey, though. Ramen.
31:39 Speaker 04 Yes, the ramen is so key, so when you're like doing the Korean night out drinking and you do the shots, you do the cocktails, you do the food, you keep going. But I feel like no good Korean night out drinking is complete without having like a late night bowl of instant ramen, half drunk, like standing over the sink, so I'm really excited to try Peter's.
32:05 Dan Pashman? Just then, as if on cue, Peter brought out the three ramens that he made. Okay, it actually was on cue, we waved him over. Anyway, to be clear, these were sauced noodle dishes, not ramen soups. Alright, well, it's been a long night of drinking, by which I mean an hour or two in the middle of a weekday afternoon of drinking.
32:25 Dan Pashman? I think I'm ready for some ramen. Peter, walk us through these three real quick.
32:29 Speaker 03 Alright, so first up, we've got a ramen dish inspired by frijoles de la olla. Stewed beans fortified with some aromatics and some oregano.
32:38 Dan Pashman? Frijoles de la olla is a traditional Mexican dish. Peter's adaptation has black beans cooked with onion, garlic, and jalapeno. But instead of being served over a bed of rice, Peter serves it over a bowl of instant ramen.
32:49 Speaker 03 And then, just like a whole flurry of toppings, you've got radishes on there, you've got jalapenos, you've got cilantro, you've got cotija cheese, and squeeze some lime juice over the whole thing. Next up, we've got a cacho y pepe. Instant ramen. And so you just bloom the black pepper in butter. And then cook the instant ramen in that. And let the water basically go down into a sauce like consistency. Then you finish it with more butter. And of course, a pecorino romano.
33:15 Dan Pashman? Peter said he was worried about kachoy pepe purist coming after him for this recipe. But Irene and I did a kimchi carbonara recipe for my cookbook. So as I told Peter, it was a safe space.
33:25 Speaker 03 And then the last one is a mafe instant ramen. And that one is cooked with garlic and ginger, tomato, as well as peanut peanut butter. You add that to give it the peanutiness. And then simmered with the scotch bonnet pepper, which gives a little spice.
33:40 Dan Pashman? Yeah. Mafe is a West African peanut stew. This recipe was inspired by Peter's time in the Peace Corps in Cameroon. All these dishes looked so good. We started with the kachoy pepe ramen.
33:51 Speaker 04 The kachoy pepe is so creamy. I feel like this dish is a really good dish to make with instant ramens because of the chewy like noodles.
34:02 Dan Pashman? That's insane. I also feel like one bite of this will absorb all the alcohol that could be in your system.
34:09 Speaker 04 That's exactly what you want to have after you've been drinking all day.
34:12 Dan Pashman? Next, we tried the mafe ramen.
34:14 Speaker 04 Oh, wow. Yeah, it really gets a lot of those flavors in it. Like the peanut is nice. Mmm, that's a really good spice.
34:23 Dan Pashman? Then the frijoles de la olla. If it's okay with you, I'm gonna go ahead and squeeze some lime on top. Do you have your permission to do that?
34:30 Speaker 04 Yes, go for it. I really feel like I'm being transported all around the world.
34:35 Dan Pashman? Well, it makes sense that Peter would make a cookbook that involves transporting you around the world. Where has this guy not been?
34:40 Speaker 04 Oh, I'm glad you squeezed that lime because it really makes it. Especially after sort of all like the richness of the ramen, the lime is really key.
34:49 Dan Pashman? Oh, man, are you craving ramen right now as much as I am? I am literally gonna be eating a bowl of it five minutes after I finish telling you this story. Anyway, in the end, what did I learn from my Korean drinking party with Irene and Peter? One, shots are especially fun with a lower alcohol drink like soju. So you can have a few shots with bites of food in between. Two, I like this rule that you never pour your own drink. You pour for someone else. It means you're always looking out for the others at the table. Three, ramen's even better after a few drinks. This has been a super fun Korean night out in the middle of the afternoon. So congrats to both of you and your phenomenal cookbooks. And this has been a blast and cheers. Thank you so much. Cheers.
35:31 Dan Pashman? Every Wednesday I say we do this. That sounds good. Yeah. Absolutely. Yeah, I'm in. Anytime.
35:38 Dan Pashman? My thanks to my old friends Irene and Peter. Irene used bar in Brooklyn is Orion Bar, and her new cookbook is Soju Party: How to Drink and Eat Like a Korean. Peter Kim's new cookbook is Instant Ramen Kitchen: Forty Plus Delicious Recipes That Go Beyond the Packet. And if you want to find out more about Peter's interactive dinner series, Infinite Table, check it out at theatable.com. That's the digit eight. We'll also put links to everything in our show notes. Also, final reminder that I will be interviewing Peter at You and Me Books in New York's Chinatown tomorrow night, September 9th, at 7:00 PM. Make sure you check out my Instagram to see everything we ate and drank today, as well as that video of me attempting a Soju tornado. On Instagram, I'm at thesporkful. Next week on the show, you may have heard about this recent controversy around Cracker Barrel,
36:23 Dan Pashman? who rolled out a brand-new logo, and there was a major backlash. So what exactly was the backlash about? Well, it turns out it was about something bigger and deeper than just a font selection. Next week on the show, we're going to delve into Cracker Barrel's history. It's a company that's no stranger to controversy. We're going to try to find out exactly what this recent issue was really about. That's next week. While you wait for that one, check out some of our recent reheat episodes. Every Friday, we bring back some of our favorite episodes from the archives, ones that aren't available anywhere else on our feed. I had a super fun conversation with Sam Erby, who has many strong opinions about condiments, burritos eaten over the kitchen sink, and how to think about food when you have a chronic illness. I also talked to relationship advice columnist Dan Savage about food and relationships, and how he manages a mixed-food marriage,
37:08 Dan Pashman? or what I call a polyeaterish relationship. Check out those reheats wherever you got this episode. And hey, did you know you can listen to The Sporkful on the SiriusXM app? Yes, the SiriusXM app, it has all your favorite podcasts, plus over 200 ad-free music channels curated by genre and era, plus live sports coverage. Does your podcasting app have that? And there's interviews with A-list stars and so much more. It's everything you want in a podcast app and music app, all rolled into one. And right now, Sporkful listeners can get three months free of the SiriusXM app by going to siriusxm.com/sporkful. This episode was produced by me along with managing producer Emma Morgenstern. and senior producer Andres O'Hara. It was edited by Camille Stanley. Our engineer is Casey Holford. Music help from Black Label Music. The Sporkful is a production of Stitcher Studios.
37:53 Dan Pashman? Our executive producer is Camille Stanley. Until next time, I'm Dan Pashman.
37:57 Speaker 05 And I'm Christine from Brooklyn, reminding you to eat more, eat better, and eat more better.
38:06 Speaker 06 What kind of day is it? It's a White Claw day. Grab a pack, grab your friends, everything else in life can wait. Your friends shouldn't. Let's go. White Claw. Grab life by the claw. Please drink responsibly. Heart's also with flavors. White Claw's also work Chicago, Illinois.
38:21 Speaker 07 Time for a quick break to talk about McDonald's. It's the tangiest time of the year. For a limited time, head to McDonald's and get a McRib sandwich. Make it a meal by adding a medium fries and a soft drink like an ice cold Diet Dr. Pepper. So grab a McRib sandwich and embrace the tang. Save time by ordering ahead on the app. At participating McDonald's for a limited time. Dr. Pepper is a registered trademark of Dr. Pepper, 7-Up Inc.
Previous Writer Samantha Irby Is Having Fewer Over-The-Sink Moments (Reheat) Next How To Host Your Own Porkapalooza Page updated November 1, 2026 · transcript and summary are machine-generated