Shaved-Pork Gamjatang · Jung Ho-young

Set a pot over medium-high heat and stir-fry the shaved pork belly on its own — no oil — until it loses its pink and the fat starts to run, about 3 minutes.

💡 Frying it first, rather than dropping it into liquid, is what buys back some of the depth you gave up by skipping the bones. Shaved belly renders plenty of its own fat, so adding oil just makes the pot greasy.

Cut the potato into big chunks and add it to the pot with 200 ml of water and the whole carton of sagol stock. Bring it to a boil.

Cut the sour kimchi into bite-size pieces and add it in.

💡 It has to be properly sour, not fresh. Aged kimchi brings the acidity that would normally come from hours of simmering — fresh kimchi just tastes like raw cabbage floating in soup.

Add the seasonings: minced garlic (1큰술), gochujang (0.5큰술), doenjang (1.5큰술), tuna extract (2큰술) and gochugaru (1.5~2큰술).

Press the pastes against the side of the pot with your ladle until they dissolve and nothing is left floating in lumps.

💡 Note the ratio — three times as much doenjang as gochujang. Most people reach for gochujang first because gamjatang is red, but the backbone of that flavour is doenjang. Gochujang here is a supporting note, not the lead.

Boil steadily until the potato is fully cooked — around 12–15 minutes for big chunks. Test it with a chopstick: it should slide through without any grain of resistance.

Let it keep bubbling while you slice the green onion and the Cheongyang chilies, and stack and roll the perilla leaves to shred them.

💡 Don't cut the perilla early. Sliced perilla leaf browns at the cut edges within minutes and its perfume — the thing you actually want — starts leaving the moment you cut it.

When the pot has come to a full rolling boil, add the green onion and Cheongyang chilies.

Add the black pepper (0.5큰술), then the shredded perilla leaves.

Finally stir in the perilla seed powder (3큰술) and let it boil once more — about a minute — until the broth thickens slightly and turns opaque and nutty.

💡 Perilla powder is the whole disguise. It thickens the broth just enough to fake the body that bone collagen would have given, and its nutty smell is the single thing your nose reads as 'gamjatang'. Add it early and it settles and scorches on the bottom.

Kill the heat and serve it boiling hot, straight from the pot, with a bowl of rice alongside.