In Praise of Gimbap — Which Is Not Korean Sushi
Korean gimbap may look similar, but there are big differences in taste and technique
Whenever I make gimbap, I think about my halmoni. It was the last meal she made for me before she died.
Halmoni immigrated from South Korea to help take care of me while my parents worked. One night when I was 7, she brought me a plate of gimbap for dinner — white rice (bap in Korean) and strips of good ol’ American Oscar Mayer bologna wrapped in a single sheet of roasted seaweed paper (gim). She’d sliced the long cylinder into perfect spheres, like little black tires with white walls, before walking to a neighbor’s house so I wouldn’t see her collapse. My mom told me later she had a heart attack.
Maybe that’s why gimbap feels so personal to me. Whenever I make it, my American in-laws and friends look on with interest. “Sushi!” they exclaim excitedly, and I immediately correct them.
Nothing irks me more than hearing someone confuse these two, albeit similar, Asian dishes.
To most Americans, the differences between gimbap and sushi are easily overlooked…
