Kimchi Sundubu

Kimchi Sundubu In my humble opinion, one of the most delicious dishes on the planet is kimchi sundubu. Sundubu, a spicy tofu soup-like dish comes in many varieties but since I’m not a big fan of seafood, I prefer it when it is served without clams or other seafood in it. I have found that restaurants offering more than one variety and serving “kimchi sundubu,” will, in addition to adding kimchi to the soup, often give you a few scraps of beef in the dish instead of clams.

I’m not sure how the best kimchi sundubu is made but the combination of the spicy red pepper soup, onions, copious amounts of nicely saturated tofu, kimchi, egg, and a side bowl of rice is to me the absolute perfect meal and usually goes for a price of 5000-8000 won here in Korea ($6-9 or so) and around the same price at Korean restaurants in the US. The side bowl of rice is great for dipping in the soup to give it a nice spicy flavor, or you might just dump the whole bowl in the soup while you eat.

Raw Eggs for Sundubu
While there is also often an egg in the sundubu when you get it, some restaurants just have a basket of raw eggs on the table. When they serve the sundubu in its stone pot, it is usually still boiling. You simply crack your egg into the soup and within a few minutes, the egg white is almost indistinguishable from the tofu. It occurred to me recently that this practice might seem strange to some foreigners, but since I long ago got used to eating raw eggs in Japan with my gyûdon, either cracked on top of the dish or mixed in a side dish with soy sauce (which isn’t even partially boiled in the process) it seems perfectly normal to me now.