[0:05]Stool.
[0:08]Not this, but this. The second definition. And I'm not saying this just for shits and gigs. See what I did there, shits and gigs. But poop is more important than you think. Not only does it make the funniest jokes, but your gut and brain are very interlinked. Take a look at this article from Harvard Medical School. Your gut and your brain is connected by what is often called a gut brain axis. And more and more research is showing a strong link between gut problems and mental health. So in short, your gut health isn't only just for your physical well-being, but it's also for your mental well-being. So in this video, I'll cover four things. First, why Korean meals are great for gut health. Second, how to make Korean mixed grain rice. Third, five gut-friendly meal prep recipes. And last but not least, I'll show you a week of my lunches and how I prepare them. To clarify, this is a meal prep that's meant to lose weight or gain muscle, but one to live a happier and healthier gut life. Okay. That's it. Chapter one, why Korean meals are great for gut health. You see, when it comes to gut health, there's nobody who does it like Koreans. On average, Koreans consume about 22 kilos of kimchi per person per year, but wait a second, 106 liters of beer per person? What the hell is going on in Germany here? It's not just kimchi. Korean meals are gut-friendly because of how we eat. This is what an average school lunch in Korea looks like. Oh, looks pretty good. Oh, yeah. And something I grew up eating. Let me compare that to an average American school lunch.
[2:01]Children shouldn't be eating this. In Korea, there's a nutritionist at every school to make sure that the students get a healthy amount of macro and micronutrients needed because eating habits are formed from an early age. And they all follow a pretty simple formula. Rice, soup, a veggie dish, protein dish, something fermented, usually kimchi, and fruit for dessert. This way of eating with several small sides is what Koreans call Banchan culture. Instead of one big side, there's a variety, meaning more fiber, more broader mix of nutrients, and it's just something that we do without thinking in our daily life. So use this as a formula as a template for a healthy servings of carbs, veg, fiber, protein and a meal that's actually enjoyable. And if you're new to making mixed grain rice, my suggestion is start with 80% white rice and 20% mixed grain and then increase the amount of mixed grain as you go, because your gut it needs time to, you know, warm up to it.
[3:06]Definitely a little bit more harder to digest. It's gonna be a shock, so just gradually increase it as you go. So here I have some white rice, which is sushi rice, and this one is black rice. This is what gives Korean mixed grain rice that purple hue. Pearl barley and it adds a really nice textural pop. This one is millet. It's that like yellow embedded specs, and also helps the rice kind of clump up a little bit better together, and it's very, very high in micronutrients. And last but not least, I have some black soy beans. I try to slide in a different bean into my rice every time just so that I can get a little variety. It's a great source of protein, it's great for gut health and it keeps me fuller for longer. It's not my favorite though, so I try to change it between black soy bean, chickpeas, peas, kidney beans. If it's hard for you to buy all these different individual types of grains, if you go to a local Chinese or an Asian grocery store, they almost always will sell like a mixed grain mix. This one here for example has like kidney beans, soy beans, peas, almond, some um glutinous rice, because it's easier for everything to stick together as well. But you can also just buy these instead, and you can have like seven different types of grains. Easy. So, I'm going to do two cups white rice. And then I'm going to do a quarter cup of each grain. Black rice, pearl barley, some millet. And we're going to give it a rinse for five to six times. And the best is to soak it in water for 30 minutes before cooking, so you get an evenly plump and cooked grains. Beans is a superfood, it's good for the planet, we should be eating more of them. But my least favorite thing on earth, not to be dramatic, is crunchy undercooked beans because it makes me gassy as hell. And the key to making sure your beans aren't hard is making sure that they're cooked before you add it in to the pressure cooker or to the rice cooker. So these are the same beans that I soaked last night. And look at the difference. And as I just talked about before, you can use whatever dried bean and it's the same method that you'll be using. Soaked it, cook it, and then add it in, but I don't want to be cooking beans every time I want mixed grain rice. So what I usually do is cook it and then freeze the rest and just add a handful whenever I want from the freezer so that it's easy to take it out. And for the actual cooking process, cook the soaked beans in fresh water, bringing it to a boil, then simmer until soft. So this has been simmering for about 30 minutes, and so it looks like. Now, for your vessel of choice for cooking the rice, you can use a pressure cooker, an instant pot, a regular pot. But by far, the best is going to be a rice cooker. I'm going to drain the soaked rice. For the amount of water, you want to do one to 1.1 ratio for mixed grain to water ratio. You need a little more than what you would need to cook regular white rice, because it is mixed grains. If you forget to soak it, you want to do one to 1.4 because it needs more water and more time to cook it through, but it's not going to result in a rice that's as fluffy and soft. So yeah, the rice cooker is going to take care of it and you just wait. Our rice is ready. Once the rice is done, give it a gentle fluff with a wet spatula. Set aside what you'll eat for today and for the next few days, then portion the rest and freeze for later. And while it's hot, don't close the lid, just put it diagonally so the rice doesn't dry out, but it has some of the excess moisture can evaporate out. So just leave it like this for 10, 15 minutes on room temperature and then close it up and put it in your fridge. Chapter three, five gut-friendly meal prep recipes. Our first recipe is going to be a Korean bibimbap bowl. So we'll be making a namul out of carrots, green beans, bean sprouts, a heck ton of spinach, and ground beef. But your bibimbap, your rules, so put whatever ingredients that's readily available in your area. So you want to cut the carrots into match sticks. If this process gives you stress, just use a mandolin with teeth on, you can just grate it, or you can even just buy the ones that are pre-cut. It's going to be fine because we'll be sauteing them. Those will be more dry, but it saves time. But if you want to just cut it yourself, you want to slice these into even sheets so that it's easy to chop later on. We're at the fun part, which is blanching. Bean sprouts, and just a couple seconds so that it still retains that crunchiness. And then just want to squeeze the excess. And voila! And the reason why we blanch is because it keeps its crunchiness for much longer compared to when it's fresh, and it also reheats incredibly well if you freeze it. Next up is going to be a whole pack of spinach, but don't worry, this is going to shrivel up into like 20%, not even of its original size. Especially spinach, you unlock a lot of extra micronutrients by blanching it, and also stays green for much longer then compared to if you'd be eating it raw.
[8:21]And we're doing the same process for the green beans, cutting it into bite-size pieces to make it easier for mixing, blanching, then drain. We're going to sauté carrots and beef. And I'm going to sauté it in one tablespoon of neutral oil, and a teaspoon of sesame oil just for the aroma. Neutral oil is going to bring the smoke point up, whereas the sesame oil is going to give it that nice nuttiness.
[8:51]So this is the texture you want, bendy, but still has a little crispness to it. Into the same pan, goes our ground beef. We're giving this a quick sauté, breaking it apart with a spatula so the excess moisture can evaporate. Once the meat has started to brown a little bit, we're going to go in with two tablespoons of soy sauce, two tablespoon of minced garlic, and one tablespoon of ginger, all pre-prepped like a Korean. This is something that we always have in the freezer. This is meal prep that we do once a month, prep a lot of ginger, a lot of garlic, so we have it always ready in the freezer. And it's easy to take a block out whenever you need it. And you want to adjust the sugar to your liking. I'm putting a little bit of brown sugar for a tiny bit of extra caramelization and sweetness. Once your ground beef is fully cooked through and looking like this, give it a quick taste test and set it aside to cool. So here we have our bean sprouts, spinach, carrots, ground beef, and string beans. These two are already seasoned, so I'm going to season the rest with a little bit of salt and sesame oil. And now, it's time for assembly. Around a heaping cup of mixed grain rice. A lot of Korean people order bibimbap for lunch, especially if you're working, because it's a great way to have a lot of fiber and just in one bowl. This is kind of like having a whole lunch tray full of different protein and veggies all in one bowl. And every bowl of bibimbap is not complete without crowning it with a fried egg, so that's exactly what we're doing. And for our sauce, my favorite is just a dollop of gochujang because it adds that nice like savory note. And an extra drizzle of sesame oil and sesame seeds, because I'm Korean.
[10:33]Bibimbap meal prep.
[10:37]The recipe is going to be available in the description box. I did measurements for five servings just if anyone wants to have a whole week's worth of lunches, which is why I had a little bit leftover.
[10:51]You can also make this into kimbap feeling for those who have more time, but this is a great idea for those who want to also pack lunch to the office or for school. And overall just really, really nice to have because you know you're getting so many colors of veggies and fiber.
[11:10]Recipe two for your gut health is going to be Hoedupbap. So Hoedupbap is a dish that's commonly eaten, especially during the summers. You can think of it as a Korean ceviche, or maybe even Korean poké. You know, in that realm, and I like having one raw crunchy, almost salad-like component when I'm doing meal preps because, because I do. I did this trick in the Costco meal prep, if you want to go check it out over here, but we're going to cure the salmon to make sure that they're good to eat for sushi grade. So this is just a mixture of three tablespoon salt to two tablespoon sugar to help draw out some of the excess moisture from the salmon. Essentially, what we're going to do is briefly cure the salmon just to draw out some of the moisture so that the flesh get nice and taut, and just set it like this for one hour, and we're going to rinse it and cut it into portions. My knife available at DoobyMart.com. I set aside the thicker end of the salmon for steaks, which we'll be utilizing in our dish number four, and the thinner portion I cubed up for our hoedupbap.
[12:17]Ideally, do this a week in advance before your meal prep so that it stays frozen. I think the best way to portion fish is to have it individually portioned and put it in the freezer. That way, you can just take one out whenever you need it. And my tip and trick is to lay it flat, so it defrost easier.
[12:33]And the key to making a good hoedupbap is texture in terms of composition. And I'm just going to thinly julienne the lettuce so that it stays nice and fluffy. And we're also going to add some carrots. I julienned them when we were doing the bibimbap prep, so that's ready. My mama always told me that you need to eat your colors, so we're going to add some red cabbage. You almost want to like shave it off. Kind of just move it around so that you're not getting like massive big chunks of red cabbage. And for a little spicy component, sliced onion. But we're going to kind of get rid of some of that spiciness by putting it in the water when it's sliced so that bitterness can kind of come out. Cho-hoe-yo, Danny. Pickled radish. In Korean, we call this danmuji, but you can also find it at many Chinese grocery stores, which is what I did here in Madrid. If you have any other pickled things that you prefer like ginger, or garlic, whatever it is, you can also just use that. Give it a quick rinse. We're only going to use half, so like this, and this one, I'll make a quick side dish that's popular in Korea. And then, just to give it a little bit more of a textural difference, I will be cubing these into small pieces. You can also just use a food processor, cut little chunks of it and just food process it into little. You don't want it to be mush. This is the consistency you're looking for. Fine. And I know when I'm doing this, there's going to be people out there being like, oh, but this isn't like lactofermented pickles. This is pickle sugar and vinegar. Shut up. A little bit doesn't hurt nobody, and it adds nice fun element to the dish. Me fighting with the ops in my head. And then for the remainder, it doesn't have to be perfect moon slices, the point of it is to kind of get it like crinkled up so that it can absorb sesame oil and gochugaru. And then I'm going to squeeze out some of the excess liquid. Two tablespoons of gochugaru, two tablespoons of sesame seeds, one tablespoon of sesame oil. And you want to use your hands to massage it.
[14:38]So good. Our final component is going to be one that adds a lot of micronutrients, and that is going to be seaweed.
[14:50]So this is wakame, you'll be able to find it at almost every grocery store because people are obsessed with miso soup and this is what goes into it. Not only is seaweed a great source of fiber, it also adds a really nice salty, briny aspect to your salads, and a lot of people think that it has to be like cooked or something, but you just have to rehydrate it and that's it. This does balloon, so I'm doing around half a cup. And later on, it's going to double in size. And all you have to do is just squeeze it once it's done soaking. And now, we just assemble. If you really want these to last a long time, what I would recommend for the choice of vessel is to get one of those like vacuum seal ones where you can take the air out. That way your veggie and everything is going to stay fresh for up to a week. If not, put a paper towel underneath. That way, it's kind of going to act as like a humidity control, but because I live with my roommate, we're going to finish this probably the first thing out of all the meal preps, and it's going to be fine. If you want to just eat this as a salad, instead of having the rice prepped on the side, just do a whole bottom layer of something more heartier like cabbage that can stay fresh for long. So this is the base, so if you want to bring this for lunch, just put the frozen salmon on top, and by the time you eat it, it's going to be thawed out. But you have to remember something. Every meal is not complete without sauce. We're going to make a spicy vinegared gochujang sauce, called cho-gochujang, which we eat with a lot of raw seafood in Korea. And the recipe couldn't be any simpler, it's equal parts gochujang, vinegar, sugar, and since I'm Korean, two big chunks of minced garlic, a little sprinkle of sesame seeds, and there you have homemade cho-gochujang sauce. Ooh.
[16:39]Our next dish is going to be my childhood favorite dish, and that is dakgalbi. A kilo of thighs, sweet potato, some rice cakes, optionally, but it's actually not optional, that's what makes a dakgalbi so great. Some leeks, cabbage, and onions. Leeks, great source of fiber, also very tasty. Onion, we're also going to just chop it into big chunks. Cabbage is well, we're going to use a half a head, just taking out the core. These ones, I'm just going to keep it in long strips. And for the sweet potato, traditionally, they're sliced thin, but I do like a little bit more of a bite, so I'm going to keep it around the same size as our chicken thigh. And I'm keeping the skin on sweet potatoes because that's where most of the nutrients is, and it's a great source of fiber, and I don't mind it. I actually kind of like it. Chicken thighs, it is not like a crazy amount of meat either, because you're going to feel full from so many vegetables and also sweet potato. And I like keeping them a little bit bigger because then it doesn't dry out when you reheat it in the process, and it stays nice and juicy. I'm just going to marinate this in a little bit of alcohol just for the gaminess, but if you don't consume alcohol, a tablespoon of vinegar also works fine. As for the fun part of the dakgalbi, I'll be doing around half, so two cups of rice cakes and the rest I'll put in a ziplock bag and then just put it in the freezer so I can take however much I want for a future tteokbokki or stir-fry. Before we get into the sautéing process, let's get our sauce ready so we don't feel stressed. So, very simple, it's going to be equal parts of gochujang. I'm going to go with half cup, and then half cup soy. And for the level of spiciness and the color, half cup gochugaru, which is Korean chili flakes. Half cup of liquid sweetener of your choice. You can use honey, maple syrup, rice malt syrup, if you prefer something a little less sweet, and you can also use sugar, but you're not going to get like that really nice gloss though. And we're going to go with around one-fourth cup of minced garlic. Actually, a little secret tip to make this even better is one tablespoon of rice wine vinegar. As you cook, the acid will evaporate and it gives a really nice aroma. I like having two spatulas ready so that you can kind of do this motion, you know. We're going in with leeks and sweet potato, giving it a light roast, then chicken, onion, and cabbage. I know it looks like a lot right now, but it's going to shrink in size as the water evaporates and cooks out. And once you start to see a little bit of color evenly, and you're going to start noticing some of the water coming out of the cabbage, and we didn't add any water. And that is going to be super sweet and flavorful. You can see that the volume of all the veggies have reduced to almost half. And there's a lot of liquid coming from the cabbage and the onions. So, we're going to cook the rice cake in that soup.
[19:36]And since we ain't young hoes, we're going to turn the heat from high to medium-low.
[19:45]It's been about 15 minutes, let's check if the sweet potato is done.
[19:54]Wow, dakgalbi meal prep. I have some of the leftover baby gem from the hoedupbap, so this is just going to go in a separate container, and when I eat it, I'll just take a little bit out to make some little lettuce wraps. I'm very proud.
[20:10]One of my favorite things to eat, especially during the winter, is salmon pot rice. And in this version, it rests on a bed of scallions and green beans for a fresh pop of green. We're chopping the green beans into small pieces, and just like with the bibimbap, is blanching time again. This helps the beans keep their vibrant color and crisp texture. Set them aside while we cook the fish. If you're not the most confident cooking fish in stainless steel pan, this is a really nice hack. Get around. So kind of do this to get the approximate diameter. Cut it like you would with a cartouche, which is just a fancy word for paper lid that looks like a doughnut. We're going to do the same except just line the bottom. So if it's like here, should be right here. And you just want to cut it straight like this. With a cartouche, you want to cut the center. We're just trying to make a circle, so like this. And just place this on the bottom. Turn your heat on to a drizzle of neutral oil. And I'm going to place the fish on now when the pan is still cold. And just season it. It does not stick at all if you do this trick, especially for fish without skin, I find this to be the most foolproof method because you don't want to overcook fish and you want to bring it up gently, but you're working with stainless steel, so this is really, really nice. Once it's about halfway cooked, flip it and cook the other side for a few minutes, then set it aside while we assemble. Here, I'm starting with a cup of mixed grain rice, followed by a cup of green beans and a generous sprinkle of sliced scallion tops. Slide in the beautiful pan-fried fish and finish with a little citrus to squeeze over just before serving. I'm going to make a little sauce to pour over our rice. And it's going to be a blend of white scallion bottoms, soy sauce, rice wine vinegar, a little bit of ginger, sesame seeds, and if you want a little extra sweetness, if you'd like. Nice and sour and acidic, but I think that acidity really balances well with the green beans, as well as the fish. So I like it, but if it's too sour for you, add a little bit more sweetener. And it'll be a good balance. Salmon pot rice inspired meal prep is finished.
[22:28]This next meal is one I don't eat when I'm cutting. I'm not cutting anymore because it's wintertime. You got to fatten up. It's my hibernation mode. But if I were, this is the number one dish that I would be eating, and it is cabbage rolls. I'm making four rolls for each, so 16 is how many we need. I also have around four cups of bean sprouts, as well. And four enoki mushrooms, shredded a little bit into bite-size pieces just so they're not too tough when we're eating them. Like this. And here, I have some frozen beef rolls. They'll sell this at any Asian grocery store for shabu-shabu. If not, ask your butcher for a Philly cheesesteak cut.
[23:19]And to assemble it, I like to do a bed of bean sprouts.
[23:25]If you want it to last for longer, what I would recommend is to steam these so that they're cooked so that it will last longer. This also freezes incredibly well. Cabbage roll cutting meal.
[23:50]And for sauce, we're going to go with one-fourth cup of soy sauce. Rice wine vinegar, half cup water, and a little bit of sweetness to adjust to your liking. I'm going to go with two tablespoons. Leftover cabbage from making cabbage rolls. We're going to make a super simple soup that's going to go well with everything that we've cooked for this week. I'm going to make napa cabbage doenjang guk. So, when most people think about doenjang, they think about the doenjang jjigae that you get at Korean barbecue, which is the more concentrated version. But doenjang guk is the more diluted version that we often eat at home. One liter of water, one-fourth cup of soybean paste. So doenjang is different from miso, where miso, you don't want to let it boil. For doenjang, actually letting it boil kind of helps with mellowing out some of the funkiness, so we're going to let it just come up to a boil, and once it does, we're going to drop our napa cabbage in. At this point, you want to give it a little taste test. Very good. The sweetness of the napa cabbage really, really works well with the funky doenjang, and you want to adjust the seasoning with fish sauce. I'm going to go in with two tablespoons of fish sauce. And the reason why I'm using fish sauce, even though doenjang is salty, is because different salting agents bring out different flavor profiles, and I find that it has more depth and complexity. It's mild and soothing and umami driven, and it's going to go well with all the dishes that we've prepped. I'm going to add a little bit more extra kick with some chilies. Let's see how everything looks all together. And this is the final meal prep. All recipes, obviously, are going to be available in the description below, and I hope this is helpful. We're going to eat well and poop well. Let's do a final recap of everything we've made. We have bibimbap, salmon pot rice, hoedupbap, dakgalbi, and cabbage and mushroom roll. We have our pickled doenjang guk, napa cabbage, soybean soup, some baby gem lettuce to go along with the dakgalbi. Extra mixed grain rice for the hoedupbap, some pickled radish, sauce for the hoedupbap, aka cho gochujang, sauce for our salmon pot rice, and a soy vinaigrette for the cabbage rolls. I'm very proud.
[26:04]We're going to eat well and poop well.
[26:09]Chapter four, a week of my lunches and preparation. Good morning. I just went to the gym and I am so tired and I need to get my protein. What should I eat? I'm going to go with the bibimbap first. Look at this. I'm going to microwave this for two minutes so that everything warms up nicely. And I'll show you when it's ready.
[26:42]Beautiful. I'm also going to heat up some soup on the side. The soup is actually pretty good cold too, but it's raining in Madrid, so I want something brothy. And obviously because I'm Korean, I'm going to get a little plate of cold kimchi from the fridge and that's going to be my meal. Oh my God, look how good this looks. We're going to do three spoonful of the soup to kind of help everything mix together. The beauty of bibimbap is that everything is individually seasoned, so you get layers of flavor. Looks so good. Wow. So good. You know what? I'm gonna add a little bit more gochujang because I'm Korean. Look at this bite. So good.
[27:41]Clean ball club. Came back from workout, I want to shower, but before I do, I'm going to take a piece of the frozen salmon out so that it can defrost while I shower. That color looks really great. Okay, I'm just going to put the salmon like this and I'll be back showered and clean, looking like a very different person than I do now. That might have been the world's worst jump transition, but I moved the camera. Look at this like it was caught right off the coast of Norway. And if you're wondering why I'm wearing a T-shirt that says Deutschland, it's because I thrifted it and it said my name. I'm not 27, I'm 28, but I just liked it. I bought it when I was 27 with my name. Oh, soup. I'm not going to eat it with rice today because I just want it with salad. Let's mix this bad boy up.
[28:35]I'm telling you, Korean vinegar cho-gochujang sauce is unbeatable.
[28:44]Being able to meal prep sushi-grade salmon is a luxury that only Costco can give you. This is my favorite meal prep I've ever done. So fresh. Don't waste your money on $16 slop bowls. This is the way to go. Wow.
[29:42]Hello, for lunch we're going to make steamed mushroom beef cabbage rolls. That's a mouthful to say. I'm going to add a little bit of water so that it has enough to steam. And into the microwave for about four minutes. Do you see the steam rising? Looks so good.
[30:23]I'm going to go for the rice cake first. I actually took this one out of the freezer and microwaved it for about four minutes with a little bit of water on top of the rice and covered it, it's good as new. I love rice cake. And that's it. That was all five meals. Hope you enjoyed it and hope you use this as a little inspiration for your next meal prep. Stay healthy and gut-friendly. I'll see you again in next video.
