This Korean BBQ Sauce Makes My Cooking Seem Way Better Than it Is

It takes a lot of things to make me motivated enough to make a sauce from scratch and store it in my fridge. It needs to be easy to make — which this one is. I define easy to make as including a small ingredient count, or primarily made up of ingredients I keep in stock. With the exception of two slightly fringe fruits, everything here is in my pantry or fridge. Moreso, it needs to be versatile — I’m not going to spend the time to make a sauce I can’t use on at least a few dishes. I have put this very simple sauce on what’s nearing ten different otherwise ho-hum meal-prepped lunches and it has drastically lifted each’s taste profile. Lastly, it needs to be good. The inclusion of kiwi and pear threw me off at first, but this worry was purely speculative and, as it turns out, completely idiotic. The recipe that follows is from chef and restaurateur Bill Kim’s debut cookbook, Korean BBQ: Master Your Grill in Seven Sauces which is available now.

Korean BBQ Sauce

Makes 4 Cups

Ingredients:
1 cup dark brown sugar
½ cup water
1 cup soy sauce
1 small white onion, coarsely chopped
1 Asian pear, peeled and coarsely chopped
1 kiwi, peeled and coarsely chopped
8 cloves garlic, peeled
1 (1-inch) piece fresh ginger, peeled and sliced
¼ cup toasted sesame oil

From Bill Kim’s Korean BBQ: Master Your Grill in Seven Sauces

Korean BBQ is Bill Kim’s first cookbook, and it’s not the strictly Korean cookbook its name implies. Kim was born in Korean but raised in the midwestern US, and his cooking and style reflect that. The recipes in the book aren’t trying to dazzle you with complexity — the opposite is true; their simplicity is what pulls you in. Buy Now: $19

1. Combine the brown sugar, water and soy sauce in a bowl and whisk until the sugar dissolves. Transfer the mixture to a food processor, add the onion, pear, kiwi, garlic and ginger, and process for about 2 minutes, until completely smooth. Add the sesame oil and blend until fully combined.

2. Transfer to an airtight container and refrigerate for up to 2 weeks or freeze for up to 2 months. Or freeze in standard ice cube trays, then transfer the cubes (they’ll be about 2 tablespoons each) to plastic freezer bags and freeze for up to 2 months.

Reprinted with permission from Korean BBQ: Master Your Grill in Seven Sauces, copyright © 2018 by Bill Kim with Chandra Ram. Published by Ten Speed Press, an imprint of Penguin Random House LLC.

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