Ji Hye Kim

Ji Hye's Five Rules for How to Make a Delicious Korean Meal at HomeFor many home cooks, Korean food is something they love to eat but feel intimidated to make. In this episode, Ji Hye Kim, the chef, owner, and managing partner of Miss Kim and Little Kim in Ann Arbor, shares her Five Rules How to Make a Delicious Korean Meal at Home. She talks about making the cooking feel approachable without stripping away what makes it special. From building a thoughtful pantry to understanding the role of banchan, the stories behind iconic dishes, and ultimately finding the confidence to make them your own, Ji Hye offers a roadmap that is as practical as it is inspiring. Whether you’re making your first batch of tteokbokki or simply looking to bring new flavors into your kitchen, these are lessons that will stay with you long after dinner is over.I love this episode because it reminds me that learning something new almost always begins with a little uncertainty. Picking up an unfamiliar cuisine asks you to invest your time, your curiosity, and yes, a little money as you stock a new pantry or hunt down ingredients you’ve never used before. But the return on that investment lasts a lifetime. Once you understand the flavors, the techniques, and the stories behind a cuisine, they become part of the way you cook, the way you think, and the way you see the world. Every new dish becomes another connection to another culture, and every meal you make afterward is a little richer because you were willing to take that first step.Five Rules for the Good Life with Ji Hye KimHow to Make a Delicious Korean Meal at HomeHello and welcome to Five Rules for the Good Life. I’m your host, Darin Bresnitz.Today, I’m in Ann Arbor, Michigan, chatting with Ji Hye Kim, who is the chef, owner, and managing partner of Miss Kim and Little Kim.She’s here to share her five rules for how to make a delicious Korean meal at home.She talks about the importance of putting together an essential Korean ingredient pantry, that understanding the essence of a dish elevates what you want to make, and with enough practice, you can make any Korean dish your own.It is a great conversation for anyone who’s wanted to cook more Korean food at home or has been enticed to introduce new flavors to their cooking at large.So let’s get into the rules here on HRN.Growing Up in SeoulJi Hye, so nice to meet you all the way from Ann Arbor.I appreciate you taking the time to chat with me for the show.I am so excited to be here.Thanks for having me.You were born and raised in Seoul.What are some of the dishes from your childhood that still ground you today?Oh my god, so many because my mom was the best cook in the family and that reputation has not changed even now.Even with your own restaurant?No, absolutely not.I cannot take the title from her.She is still the absolutely the best and she cooked everything from scratch.But what I remember is tteokbokki.It’s the quintessential Korean street food.My mom forbade me from eating it because she called it a delinquent food which made me want it more.Of course.I remember sneaking out milk boxes and trading it with the street vendor and eating it behind my mom’s back and then coming home for a full Korean meal.That really stayed with me because it was the first independent decision I made about the food.I now have three or four different kinds of tteokbokki on rotation at my restaurant at Miss Kim at any given moment.Those original food memories and adventures always stick with you.Yeah.You wound up leaving Seoul and eventually landing in Ann Arbor, getting into the food world through Zingerman’s.Correct.What surprised you the most about the culinary offerings of the Midwest?The amazing array of vegetables.It’s not necessarily the same vegetables that I would have used if I lived in There are enough similarities and it actually pushes you to be more creative.Taking what my mother and my ancestors gave me and adapt that with my neighbor farmer’s beets or Jerusalem artichoke or lots of corn.And that’s actually been really fun marrying that together.You opened up your first restaurant Miss Kim in 2016 in partnership with Zingerman’s.How did you want to bring your two worlds together from what you grew up eating with in Seoul and what you discovered in the farms o