Hard kimchi

this is kimchi that can do two things at one time

Happy Wednesday, clowns!

Sorry this installment is a day late. Davida and I were busy dodging actual tornadoes here in Chicago on Monday night (the weather was bonkers), along with James Beard Awards, which were last weekend (I lost every single one of them). Now it’s time to relax, and what better way to kick back than with a nice refreshing hard seltzer?

But, that’s not all. We’re also in the middle of a sweltering heat wave. One of my favorite things to eat when it’s hot out is something known as mul kimchi. Mul kimchi is a variation of kimchi that’s heavy on the cold brine, which makes it extraordinarily refreshing when it’s hot outside. Once you’re done eating the cabbage and radish floating around in it, you’re supposed to drink the remaining liquid, which is one of the most cooling substances known to man.

Now, food these days can’t just be delicious, it needs to be functional. A drink can’t just quench your thirst, it also has to revive your sex drive. Your toothpaste isn’t just there to clean your teeth, it’s also there to deliver probiotics to your system so you can take a monster dump the next day.

So Davida suggested I make a quick kimchi using hard seltzer, because why not get more mileage out of kimchi by getting drunk while eating it?

You might be surprised to learn this, but you can use soda to make a quick kimchi, which is where Bud Light Hard Soda Seltzer comes in.

I used this recipe from Michelin-starred chef David Chang, who has a recipe for sparkling quick white kimchi at Food and Wine. In the food world, if you have a Michelin star, that means you can serve people anything, like toenail clippings on a cracker, and people will nod deeply and then give you their entire paycheck.

His recipe contains 7-Up, which is an ingredient some Korean households use in marinades and kimchi dishes, though this wasn’t particularly common in my house growing up.

Instead of using 7-Up like the recipe says, I decided to go for a citrus soda hard seltzer. It’s basically the alcoholic version of 7-Up, right? Bud Light is obviously perfect for kimchi.

The recipe starts with napa cabbage, which you need to slice into small bits and rinse off, because as you can see, it has a bunch of dirt on its ass.

I bet you also have a bunch of dirt on your ass too. You better go shower.

Once you’ve rinsed off the cabbage, it’s time to sprinkle a tablespoon of kosher salt on it and toss it all together.

The salt will help draw out excess moisture in the cabbage as well as season it. Try seasoning your eyeballs with salt too and a bunch of juice will also leak out.

In order for the salt to do its thing, press the cabbage down with a plate and put something bulky on top, like a partially used container of Tang.

What’s cool about this container is that I used some of it to make a crap version of orange chicken in March, and what’s going to end up happening is that I’m never going to open it again, and it’ll stay in our cupboard for decades. Someday it’ll be discovered, then displayed in a museum as an example of garbage food that people used to consume.

Just kidding, that whole canister is going straight up my ass in about five minutes.

Next, I chopped up some carrots, green onions, and some red chiles that looked terrifying but ended up being about as mild as a bell pepper.

One’s lodged up there along with the container of Tang, that’s how I know. You know exactly where.

You read this newsletter.

Then I poured the Bud Light Hard Seltzer into the vegetable mixture, along with a splash of vinegar.

Bud Light, if you hear me, please sponsor Food is Stupid. I need some of that stevia-sweetened hard seltzer money. I’ll do anything, including getting a second Bud Light Hard Seltzer tattoo on my lower back.

I put the entire mixture into a Tupperware container, took this terrible photo, then let it rest in the refrigerator overnight.

What’s interesting about this kimchi recipe is that it’s not fermented. Also it has hard seltzer in it.

I pulled it out today to try it.

The mul kimchi looked pretty; the colors were bright and it smelled okay. But then I tried some, and I realized…it was straight-up no good. And it wasn’t even because of the seltzer, though that was leaving an odd stevia-flavored aftertaste. The rest of the recipe was just off. There wasn’t enough vinegar or salt, so it tasted nothing like kimchi. It just tasted like cold hard seltzer soup or something, and not in a good way.

Davida gave it a shot and immediately made a sour face. Blech. I guess we’re not getting blitzed on kimchi this summer.

But gazpacho on the other hand…

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Thanks a lot, David Chang. Now I’m stuck with all this hard kimchi and don’t know what to do with it. Maybe I’ll just sip on the brine and complain about this heat snap in my undies while riding public transit.

If you’re a fan of the newsletter, don’t forget to share this edition on social media, since it helps grow the damn thing and I’m really just looking for Bud Light to notice me and give me seltzer money:

Okay, so the Bud Light thing probably isn’t going to work out, but don’t forget to sign up for a paid subscription! You get extra editions of the newsletter two to three times every month, like the hard gazpacho I’ll be making later this week, because I think getting trashed on food is hilarious:

And of course, a subscription unlocks all the previous paid content at foodisstupid.substack.com, which will keep you entertained while you’re hunkered down during tornado warnings, because climate change sucks donkey testicles. You need to read that extra shit, like the kitty litter miso soup I made last week while the world collapses around you.

As always, I love you all. Stay safe, and I’ll hop into some (ahem, read above) of your inboxes later this week.