Kale Kimchi Omurice and a kind Korean Ahjussi

Today I walked around downtown to do some exploring and spend quality time with myself. Who stays cooped up inside when the sun is shining and its almost 70 degrees in January? Not me!

Look at that beauty of a day!

After my adventures,* I decided to get more adventurous with my food. With an hour of exercise and three hours of walking in the sun later, I worked up an appetite. Though I drank a delicious green drink packed with kale, spinach, broccoli, apple, etc that I picked up at the Farmer's Market and my typical daily fix of a Kind bar,  I still figured I better eat a good evening meal. As usual, I didn't have much food and will need to go grocery shopping soon, so I made something up with the random foods I had. I came up with a rather fun and tasty kimchi and kale omurice! It probably exists somewhere, but I'd like to think I created something for once!! I come up with great ideas --more like yours truly reinventing the wheel. Hey, at least I can find how to best cook up what creative idea is brewing in my head if I need help bringing it to fruition.

About the kimchi and kale omurice...

I tossed extra special "sprouted" brown rice in the rice cooker....don't ask. I bought it at HMart and it was triple the price of any other rice on the shelf. I was looking for brown rice and the package says sprouted is healthier for many reasons. I don't know. Better go ask a Korean to find the legit reasoning behind it. Basically it's good for health and solves some of life's problems? Sounds good to me!

While that was cooking, I made the egg. I mixed up two eggs in a bowl (add a bit of milk or water for fluff and texture). After greasing up the old pan, cooking up the egg and placing it on a plate, I moved onto the fried rice fixins.

I started with the kale. I used the last half of an older bunch of kale. I cleaned, cut, and cooked the kale, much like the blanching you do with spinach, and set that aside.  Next, I fried and cooked the kimchi. Once that was cooked I added the kale back to the pan. Oh yeah! I snuck some carrots in and attempted to add garlic after realizing it was a bit too old. You can add more veggies, meat or whatever leftovers are in the fridge. In the future, I'll be sure to have meat protein lying around. With some sesame oil and the kimchi veggie mix, I finally added the rice! Cooked it all up and placed it in the egg!
Finally, choose the sauce. You can add ketchup or gochujang on your omurice delightful creation. All I had was sriracha as you can see in the pic below. After taking the picture, I garnished it with leftover avocado. You can never have too much avocado in any shape or form and it goes great with omelettes. The kimchi kale omurice was a lot of yumm in my mouth and quite a bit of food!
PLUS! It had kale. As far as I'm concerned, anything with kale is healthier. It's a super food! Right? Heck! You can argue the whole thing is healthy. Kimchi, kale, sprouted brown rice, egg, and sriracha. The only thing not so healthy is the sesame oil, but you've got to throw some in for the sake of having oil and that extra flavor!

Here's the creation::

Enjoy~~

Wanna try it? Make your own rendition and let me know how it works or tastes for you!

Have fun!

*Because this blog supposedly touches upon Korea related things, I'll add the part of my day where I met a Korean man (definitely ahjussi status!!) on my walk. He has lived in the US for quite some time but is originally from Daegu! Crazy! [I have this weird thing with ahjussis and boys/people from Daegu. I love Daegu dialect and happen to be able to find or attract random people from Daegu.] As I was walking, I noticed a cute dog that reminded me of my family's childhood dog. I stopped to ask the breed of his dog not knowing he was Korean...and a friendly one at that!  His dog is a maltipoo (Maltese/Poodle mix) and our childhood dog was a Bichontese (Bichon Frise/Maltese mix). They look very similar. My!...he was friendly. I knew he was nice based on the conversation with previous onlookers, but just how....I didn't know.  He asked me to sit next to him and take a picture with him and the dog. I politely declined!  He then asked if I was Korean. Apparently he could tell. I said, yes. He started speaking in Korean. Not that I needed to, but I did explain that I was adopted. I really hate when people, especially older people make assumptions and project their expectations wanting me to act culturally appropriate or speak perfect Korean. Sometimes I think by telling you I was adopted it will mitigate any strong expectations or predispositions. Who knows.

Once he found out I was Korean AND adopted he again asked me to sit down right next to him and talk. "Please!! Dear," he pats his hand down on the bench next to his lap and dog, "have a seat next to me and let's talk!" Again, I politely declined. I knew I'd be stuck there if I sat down. He is married folks! Nothing like that! (or so I hope!) He has a Caucasian wife and was giving a Korean friend and her child visiting from Korea a tour of various parts of California. They were off whale-watching while he was holding down the fort and taking care of the dog. He really wanted me to sit there and chat him up for another hour, so I could meet the woman and her 8 year old kid. Supposedly the woman spoke really good English. I talked with the ahjussi for a little longer [interesting guy] and I decided to carry on with my own day. As much as I'd love to meet more Koreans, I needed to get going.  I also love Korean kids and listening to them speak in Korean. Part of me wanted to meet them. I love the sound of the language. If not to communicate with my Korean family, I'd learn Korean to speak Korean with my future kids!  I must admit, I love having lots of older Korean friends with kids. As I walked further, just a minute later, I saw a Korean family with a very cute daughter under the age of 5.  My heart melted when I heard the daughter speaking to her mother.Too bad kids have to grow up so fast!  I might have stopped to "observe" them for a minute while stepping aside to avoid photobombing three Korean girls taking pictures of each other by the water.  : )

The dog:

K. End.


~HK~