Korean-American Cooking — Kimchi, Galbi, and the Long Generation

The arrival

Significant Korean immigration to the US dates from the 1965 Immigration and Nationality Act. By 2020 there were roughly two million Korean Americans, with concentrations in Los Angeles (Koreatown), New York, Atlanta, Houston, the DC suburbs, and the Bay Area.

The food traveled with the people. Korean-American food today is two layered things: the home cooking that immigrant families brought (slow-cooked banchan, kimchi made in apartment kitchens, weeknight stews) and the restaurant cuisine that emerged in Los Angeles Koreatown in the 1970s and 80s and is now a mainstream American dining category.

What's on the table

• Kimchi. The category, not the dish — there are over 200 documented kimchi varieties. Napa cabbage kimchi (baechu) is the most familiar. Cucumber kimchi (oi-sobagi), radish kimchi (kkakdugi), water kimchi (mul-kimchi) are equally standard in Korean homes.
• Galbi. Marinated short ribs, often grilled tableside. The marinade is soy, sugar, pear, garlic, sesame oil. The pear (specifically Asian pear or sometimes kiwi) is doing serious enzymatic work tenderizing the meat.
• Bibimbap. Rice topped with seasoned vegetables, often a fried egg, served with gochujang. Mix at the table.
• Sundubu jjigae. Soft tofu stew, often spicy, with anchovy or beef broth. A weeknight dish; takes 15 minutes.
• Japchae. Glass noodles (sweet potato starch) stir-fried with beef and vegetables. Banchan or main.
• Korean fried chicken. Twice-fried, often glazed in soy-garlic or gochujang. The mainstream American version of KFC (in the Korean sense).

Authors and chefs to read

• Maangchi (Emily Kim). Her Maangchi's Real Korean Cooking (2015) is the most accessible English-language Korean home cookbook. Her YouTube channel is a generation's home-cooking school.
• Lauryn Chun, The Kimchi Cookbook (2012). The kimchi-specific reference; Chun runs Mother in Law's Kimchi commercially.
• Hooni Kim, My Korea (2020). Restaurant-Korean from a Michelin-starred chef.
• Eric Kim, Korean American (2022). A second-generation perspective; the book documents the actual home cooking of Korean immigrant families rather than the restaurant menu.
• Roy Choi, L.A. Son (2013). The Kogi BBQ truck founder's memoir-cookbook; the moment when Korean-Mexican fusion entered American food media.

What to cook to start

• Maangchi's napa cabbage kimchi. Plan a weekend. The first 24 hours after the salt step are not patient.
• Hooni Kim's sundubu jjigae. A 20-minute weeknight stew.
• Galbi marinade from any of the above books. Marinate 4-8 hours, grill hot. Serve with rice and lettuce wraps.

The cultural moment

The 2010s and 2020s have been the second-generation correction era for Korean-American food in mainstream American media. The first generation built the restaurants. The second generation (Eric Kim, Hooni Kim, Esther Choi) is writing the books that explain the food in its own terms. Read them.

The migration timeline

Korean immigration to the United States unfolded in three major
waves:

1. 1903 to 1924. Plantation workers to Hawaii, then to the
   mainland. The numbers were small (roughly 7,000 to Hawaii).
   The community established food traditions that persist in
   Hawaii today.

2. 1950s and 1960s. Post-Korean-War immigration, including
   military brides and adoptees. The community remained relatively
   small; some early Korean restaurants opened in Los Angeles and
   New York.

3. 1965 onward. The 1965 Hart-Celler Act removed national-
   origin quotas; Korean immigration accelerated significantly.
   By 2000 the Korean-American population was roughly 1 million;
   contemporary estimates are around 1.8 million.

The food infrastructure

Los Angeles Koreatown, established in the 1970s, became the
largest Korean food district outside Korea. The dense network of
restaurants, markets, and food producers in LA Koreatown — and
later in New Jersey's Bergen County, Queens' Murray Hill, and
several Texas cities — built the infrastructure for Korean
ingredients and dishes to be available across the US.

The H Mart chain (founded 1982) was the major step. H Mart now
operates roughly 100 stores across the US, providing the gochujang,
gochugaru, doenjang, and broader pantry that makes Korean home
cooking accessible.

The dishes that crossed over

The Korean dishes that have entered the broader American food
landscape:

• Kimchi. The fermented vegetable preparation (most commonly
  napa cabbage with gochugaru, garlic, ginger, fish sauce).
  Roughly 200 distinct kimchi traditions exist in Korea; the napa
  cabbage version is the most exported.
• Galbi. Marinated grilled short ribs.
• Bulgogi. Marinated thinly sliced beef.
• Bibimbap. Mixed-rice bowl.
• Korean fried chicken (KFC, twice-fried, often with sauces
  like soy garlic or yangnyeom).
• Kimchi jjigae. The kimchi stew that surfaces in many Korean-
  American home kitchens.

The cookbook canon

The English-language Korean cookbook canon has grown
substantially since 2010. Key entries:

• Maangchi (Emily Kim). Her YouTube channel and 2015 book
  Maangchi's Real Korean Cooking are the home-cook standard.
• Hooni Kim, My Korea (2020).
• Mandu Eun Jeong for traditional Korean kimchi-making.
• Eric Kim, Korean American (2022). The book that articulates
  the second-generation Korean-American cooking identity.

The kimchi argument

Eric Kim's Korean American (2022) is a useful framing of what
the cuisine has become. The book argues for Korean-American cooking
as its own thing — neither Korean nor American but a hybrid
tradition with its own logic. The pizza-with-kimchi, the
gochujang-on-fried-chicken, the rice-bowls-with-everything — these
are Korean-American, not failed Korean.

Further reading

• Maangchi, Maangchi's Real Korean Cooking (2015) and Maangchi's
  Big Book of Korean Cooking (2019).
• Hooni Kim, My Korea (2020).
• Eric Kim, Korean American (2022).
• Sandor Katz on kimchi fermentation.