stupendous bo ssam.

okay, so i am not gonna lie..this recipe was daunting. first, the sheer quantity of meat. second, the overnight rest and six hours of cooking. third, where to procure kimchi? but all of these hurdles were easily overcome. at the end of the video, dude definitely says “it was six dollars for a four pound shoulder,” so i made the executive decision that this family was gonna use a four pound hunk of pork. done. the cooking time, while a bit unnerving is not that bad. after all, you only have to visit with the oven once every hour, so you can work on something else (like sewing a quilt) while you wait. finally, after reading the recipe countless times, it finally sunk in that the kimchi is used as a condiment…if it is missing, the meal will still go on.

the shopping list. naturally you have to gather the ingredients for the main recipe, but it must also be noted that this recipe calls for two sauces, which you need to make. like the kimchi, these are condiments, so you can probably buy something similar, but they are DELICIOUS and easy to make yourself. check out this bo ssam sauces post for the ingredients and instructions. i have to admit that i was not motivated to go on a kimchi hunt and it was not at our store, so we went without. the hunk of meat was readily available in the regular grocery store. i bought a half shoulder, because four pounds seems much more manageable. also i could not find bibb or butter lettuce, but luckily discovered that this is also called boston lettuce, which was plentiful. 

the cooking. so you wanna know how it went? weeeellll..it was definitely an interesting adventure. my plans went a bit astray on cook day, so i did not get started until 7:0opm, which meant the cooking continued until almost 2:00am. agg. the pork did not seem to give off a lot of juices, so i was “basting” with bits of blackened goo that were collecting in one corner of the pan. with about an hour to go i made the sauces and rice. relatively uneventful. carmelizing the sugar was a bit disastrous, because the drippings started burning and smoke was pouring out of the oven. yikes. but at 2 o’clock in the morning, after charbroiling our roasting pan and smoking up the entire house, the mister and i took our first bite of bo ssam. words cannot express the deliciousness. sooooooo goooooood. we had seconds. at 2:30am. on a school night. ridiculously scrumptious. ate it cold at lunch today. a. m. a. z. i. n. g.