Sweet and Spicy By Stephanie Witt Sedgwick Washington Post Staff Writer Wednesday, June 30, 1999

Kim, who lives in Rockville, comes by her talent for Asian cooking honestly. Born in Korea, Kim moved with her family to Tokyo after World War II – her father was a journalist covering Gen. Douglas MacArthur and the U.S. occupation of Japan. When Kim arrived in America as a young college student, she already had a handle on both Korean and Japanese cooking.

She met her husband, Theodore, who's also from Korea, on a blind date. A student at Georgetown's School of Foreign Service, he planned to go back to Korea after graduating and pursue a career as a diplomat. They married in 1961. "Children and a mortgage changed the plan," says Kim, and they settled in Maryland.

Over the years, Kim raised her family and ran a small restaurant and a gift shop. She also cooked for family, friends and business associates. Her reputation for fine Korean and Japanese cooking spread, and she began giving cooking classes in Annapolis and at the Trinity Presbyterian Church in Bethesda.

Now retired, she's given up most of her classes in favor of golf and her grandchildren. But Kim still spends plenty of time cooking. "When I'm at home, I'm always in the kitchen," she says. Although she's been in America for more than 40 years, she's stuck mainly to Japanese and Korean cooking because that's what she's known for. "When people come to our house, they expect gourmet Asian food."

Kim doesn't disappoint. Especially not with the traditional Korean barbecue. Kim makes everything herself right down to the kimchi – the spicy preserved cabbage that's a must at any Korean meal. But she has made a few adjustments in the United States. In Korea, grilling is done on small table top grills and always indoors. Kim uses a outdoor barbecue or the broiler. Back in Korea, beef is very expensive and would be saved for special occasions. Here, Kim can use beef all the time. And while Kim fills the table with the traditional – pickled vegetables, sauces and lettuce leaves – she also adds fresh vegetables like corn and large sweet bell peppers. "Winter is long in Korea and people rely on pickled vegetables, here we can get fresh vegetables year-round so I use them too," she explains.

Kim's husband helps start the grill, but that's the full extent of his involvement. "In Korea the mother or daughters do the cooking, men don't," she says.

Kim grills short ribs (kolbi gu) and thinly sliced steak (bulgogi) , the most popular meats to barbecue in Korea. The meat is marinated in a combination of soy sauce, sugar, sake, garlic, scallions and sesame oil. Kim has her own tricks – she drizzles kiwi juice over the meat before adding the marinade and rubs a pinch of sugar into the meat – to help tenderize. The thinly sliced steak is ready to cook in 30 minutes, the short ribs are best if allowed to marinate overnight in the refrigerator.

The meat is cooked on the grill and then served. The short rib meat, which has been butterflied before grilling, is cut into small strips and the meaty bone is served on the side. A lettuce leaf is filled with a small serving of beef slices or strips, some of the pickled vegetables or vegetable salad – daikon radish salad is common – and a sweet or hot sauce, depending on the eater's preference. Then the leaf is wrapped around the meat and vegetables forming a packet. Kim also always serves rice and the salads are served on the side as well as in the lettuce "packages."

When Kim and her husband want to eat American they tend to go out. "My daughter cooks more American, lots of pasta. But if Ted and I want pasta, we go to a restaurant. After all, I don't want to cook all the time."

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