Korean Seafood Pancake- Haemul Pajeon

Anyone who's a regular reader of my little blog will know that the InTolerant household has a deep love of Asian food


Our love affair with Chinese Dim Sum or Yum Cha is well documented, and Thai, Indonesian and Vietnamese food is on our dinner menu probably more than any other type of cooking. I have to admit though that we've never delved very deeply into Korean.
Bulgogi and Korean style BBQ are firm favourites, but it wasn't until BigJ travelled across to South Korea on business last year where he tried and fell in love with some key ingredients (see here) that I decided to do a bit of research and try a few Korean recipes at home

In a fortuitous bit of Serendipity, I caught an episode of Korean Food Made Simple on Foxtel this week where cook Judy Joo was making a yummy looking seafood pancake. It seemed like such an easy and delicious recipe that once I make it I just had to share it with you all. It doesn't actually need many Korean ingredients and is easy to change up to gluten free without any loss of taste or texture at all- yummo!


Judy Joo's Seafood  Paejeon Korean Pancake

150grm gf SR Flour
300ml cold Water
2Tab Korean Soybean Paste (*not always gluten free, so substitute with mild gf Korean Chilli Paste, gf Miso or even gf Oyster Sauce)
10 large Prawns
4 Scallops
5 Spring Onions
2 large Red Chillis
2 Garlic Cloves
Salt and Pepper
Oil for frying

Dipping Sauce
2 finely diced Spring Onions
4 tab gf Soy Sauce (Kikkomans is great)
1 1/2 tab gf Rice Vinegar
1 tab Sesame Oil
1 tab crushed toasted Sesame Seeds
1 tab Korean Chilli Flakes/ finely diced chilli

For the sauce: simply combine all the ingredients together in a small bowl and let the flavours mingle while you make the pancakes

For the Pancakes:

Cut the prawns in half through back and remove the black line. Slice the scallops through in thirds making nice thin slices as well

Julienne the spring onions lengthwise- I used this nifty little tool that you just drag through, easy-peasy

Finely chop the chilli, leave the seeds or not depending on what amount of zing you enjoy

Slice, chop or grate the garlic finely as well. For this type of recipe I like to use a microplane as biting into a big chunk of raw garlic in a pancake isn't actually that pleasant

This is the Korean Soybean Paste, Doenjang. There are some on the market that are gluten free, but otherwise substitute as suggested

My lazy style to avoid washing up is to just pop all the ingredients in a bowl as they're ready

Mix it all around well until nicely combined and covered with batter

Heat some oil in a pan over medium heat and add about one third of the batter. Fry for about 3-4 minutes, or until golden brown and crispy on the bottom

Flip over carefully and cook the other side until golden as well, about another 3 minutes or so. Make another 2 with the rest of the batter

Doesn't this look pretty- so brown and crispy!

Cut the pancake into smallish squares or wedges. No knives are on a Korean table so everything should come to the table chopstick sized

Serve while still hot and crispy with the dipping sauce

What a yummy dish indeed, the seafood is protected by the batter so it's just cooked through, still soft and sweet and the shredded spring onions mellow with the cooking. If all Korean food is this tasty, I can definitely see it becoming a staple on our table in the very near future too!

So Dear Reader, what's your favourite Asian cuisine, and have you tried much Korean food before?