It has been a few months since I last tried Samyang’s Buldak Ramen, the famous or rather infamous fire noodles from South Korea… Being a foodie I am somebody who always love trying new flavours and being also a fan of many things Korean 😛 , I have been wanting to try their famous Jjajangmyeon… So, turns out the closest thing to an authentic jjajangmyeon that I can get here is to buy the Jjajang Ramen noodles from the brand Samyang online and here we are… I have bought a couple of other variants too which I will be trying and writing about soon 🙂
So, Jjajangmyeon, for those who are not aware is basically a Korean noodle dish made using Noodles, Meat (mostly, but sometimes they use seafood) and Vegetables cooked with a thick sauce whose key ingredient is the Korean Fermented Black Bean paste… This paste in Korea which is called Chunjang, is not made of Black Beans as the name seems to suggest but rather its basically a mix of Soy Beans, Wheat Flour and Caramel thats fermented… Thanks to the use of caramel, this paste is sweet… So, the use of this Black Bean paste along with the Korean Chilli sauce gives the Jjajangmyeon a sweet, spicy and savoury taste… The dish is very popular, perhaps one of the most popular ones in the Korean cuisine…
When the checked the pack’s instructions, it was seen that the procedure is exactly the same as the Buldak Ramen and so, I made it exactly the same way and also added some vegetables and eggs as well… So, please feel free to check my post on Buldak Ramen to see the procedure as I have done exactly the same as mentioned over there… As can be seen in the pics above, the noodle pack came with the thick noodles, the sauce packer and also some topping which this time, appeared to be a handful of dried vegetables…
The above pic is the result of cooking just the noodles as per pack instructions… Like I usually do whenever I make noodles like this, I sautéed in some vegetables of my own, Carrots, Green Beans and some Cabbage this time along with an egg and mixed it into the noodles… Then I fried an egg sunny side up and served on top of the noodles on my plate… The result can be seen in the pics below…
Now coming to the taste, I must say that it essentially felt like they added the Black Bean paste to the Buldak sauce and made this product cause thats essentially what it tasted like for me… Same chicken dark meat flavour with the taste of the Gochujang (Korean Chilli sauce) with that extra kick from the use of Chilli Oil like I suspected in the case of the Buldak noodles… However, the sweetness and flavour of the Black Bean paste cuts thru all that spiciness and really does balance out the heat… So, its like you can sense the heat but as soon as you feel the heat, the sweetness from the Bean paste cools your tastebuds down… Mixing in that egg further mellows down the spice and helps you enjoy the individual flavours of the ingredients like the Chicken, the vegetables, etc well…
Overall, I think for people who are new to Korean tastes this particular noodles might be a good place to start as one can get to enjoy the Korean flavours without getting overwhelmed by the spiciness… So, if you are somebody who wants to try Korean cuisine for the first time, try this jjajangmyeon first… I for one, simply loved it and am hoping to get more… Feel free to try the same and let me know in the comments section below… As I mentioned earlier, I did get a couple more products along with this and so will be trying and posting about it soon… Have a nice day 🙂