Pumpkin Jook: A Fall Treat from Korea {Around the World in 12 Dishes}

It’s time again for a trip around the world from the comfort of our kitchen! As part of the series “Around the World in 12 Dishes,” each month participating bloggers travel the world with their kids by cooking a dish from another country and perhaps reading a book, doing a craft, or learning fun facts about it.

This month for our virtual trip to Korea I was so pleased to stumble upon a treat perfect for fall – pumpkin jook!  Jook is a rice porridge found in a number of Asian countries.  I was excited to finally try it after reading about it.  I drew inspiration from several recipes, including one from Beyond Kimchee and this one from Week of Menus.

To continue my trend of trying to find time savers for traditional recipes, I decided to use canned pumpkin rather than boiling it as in the original recipes.  I also did an experiment to see whether the soaked, pureed rice could be replaced by something I have in abundance in my pantry – baby rice cereal!  Did it work?  You’ll have to keep reading to find out …

Pumpkin Jook (Rice Porridge)

Method One

Ingredients

1/3 c short-grain rice (I used brown rice) [Use sweet rice if you can find it]

3/4 c pumpkin puree (about 1/2 of a 15 oz can)

1 & 1/2 c water

Salt

1-2 T brown sugar

Rinse the rice several times.  Monkey loved this part!

Soak the rice in one cup of water. Most recipes call for soaking at least several hours, or even overnight.  Since I was using brown rice I let it soak for a long time – approx. 7 hours.

Drain rice then puree it in a blender with 1/2 c of water.

Mix the rice puree with an additional 1 cup of water and the pumpkin and heat in a small saucepan over medium heat, stirring often, until it starts to thicken (5-10 minutes).

Stir in a pinch of salt and brown sugar to taste.  (I used 2 T).

Mmmm!

And now for my experiment:

Method Two

Ingredients

1/3 c baby rice cereal

2 c water

3/4 c pumpkin puree (about 1/2 of a 15 oz can)

Salt

1-2 T brown sugar

Mix rice cereal and water until blended.  The rice cereal will absorb much of the water.  Add additional water as needed, but only slowly.  I originally added too much water, and then it was nearly impossible to get it to thicken.  Add pumpkin and heat in a small saucepan until it begins to thicken.  Add a pinch of salt and brown sugar to taste.

So which method was best?  The original, of course.  (Isn’t it always?)  Using the rice cereal will work in a pinch, but the final result is much different.  The original method yields a thicker, chewier porridge, while the quickie method resulted in something more the consistency of tomato soup.  It still tasted great, but I preferred the other.  Then again, I like my orange juice with extra pulp!  If you are using this as baby food, I would recommend the quick method, so you have that really smooth consistency.

Overall, this is a great, filling fall treat!  It makes a great breakfast or snack, or could even be a great dessert.

To give Monkey a better sense of where this dish came from we read Pigling: A Cinderella Story. I didn’t expect Monkey to be very interested in this Cinderella story, but the fact that it was a graphic novel made it much more attractive to him.  It also provided lots of opportunities for him to absorb Korean culture through the images in this traditional tale.  He also loved some of the dramatic elements of the story, like the tornado and the bull that come to the main character’s rescue.  It is a fun read – we will definitely try graphic novels again!

Disclosure: This post contains affiliate links, which means that if you click through and make a purchase on Amazon, I will receive a small commission.

Check out the other participating blogs to see what they have been cooking up:

Adventures In Mommydom, Afterschool for Smarty Pants, All Done Monkey, Crafty Moms Share,Creative World of Varya, Glittering Muffins, Here Come The Girls, Kid World Citizen, Maroc Mama, Mermaids’ Makings, The Educators’ Spin On It

If you try a dish from Korea, we’d love to hear about it! You can also link up your dish or craft here to share your post on all the participating blogs: