In Search of Ancient Vitality

RED PEPPER PASTER ANCIENT DIETARY AID FOR WOMEN

BY Lee Won-sop

(Korea Times, Thursday, May 13, 1999)

There are two theories as to the origin of red cayenne pepper in Korea. The first school of thought has it that the spice was brought to the Korean peninsula by the invading Japanese soldiers in 1592. The second suggest that an army general of the Ming dynasty brought the pepper into Korea to make a poison gas cloud for blinding the eyes of the invading Japanese soldiers in his military effort to recapture the Pyongyang fortification.

What is quite certain is that red pepper was used in Korea since 1766. Red pepper paste was officially adopted by the royal court as a seasoning in 1848 at a feast to commemorate the construction of a royal house called Tongmyongjon and to celebrate the 60th birthday of King Honjong's mother, King Sunjo's queen. Another court record says that raw fish seasoned with red pepper along with vinegar was served at a royal feast for King Kojong in 1901.

Red pepper paste takes two simple steps to make, the first of which involves making the soybean paste. The beans are cooked and bean cakes are made and hung with the rice staw for dryness. The protein inside the beans is fermented by the yeast present in the rice staw and the final product is called "maeju," which is shaped into rectangular blocks and dried for long-term storage.

When the maeju is powdered and mixed with a gruel made of sticky-rice along with malt, and four-fifth of this mixture is combined with one-fifth of red pepper powder and fermented for over three months, then red pepper soybean paste is the result. This paste is locally known as "kochujang", and is used as a seasoning in various Korean dishes.

Red pepper contains an antibiotic substance called capsaicin, which kills germs, increases immunity once absorbed into the body, and oxidizes or burns away the fatty tissue. Hence, modern science regards capsaicin as useful for dieting, and some researchers have praised Korea for having made such a poisonous substance into a useful part of the standard food culture.

Nonetheless, some painful memories remain regarding the use of kochujang as the paste was mixed with mountain vegetables boiled in water and fed to hungry children to stave off hunger the Korean War(1950-53).

On a brighter note, Queen Elizabeth II of Great Britain showed a strong interest in the process of making kochujang and kimchi when she visited the traditional village of Hahoe in Andong, Kyongsang-pukto last April.

Overweight members of royalty and concubines turned to a diet consisting of half a bowl of cooked rice mixed with spicy kochujang after 1848. The process of getting rid of excess fat was a prime concern of women trying to stay beautiful in the eyes of their husbands.

Women of high society in particular were jealous of husbands who typically took several concubines, and they tried to lure them back to their folds by relying on an unorthodox offshoot of the red pepper diet. Red cayenne pepper powder was evenly mixed into rice wine, which was then added to bath water in a large wooden tub, inside which they endured the stinging pain and bathed in order to get rid of excess fatty tissue.

Ancient emperors of China who often lived for more than 60 years had a common recipe for longevity. The first method was active exercise in their gardens, where the water and air were pure. The second technique was avoiding stress and taking adequate rest regularly. The third method was frequently consuming cooked glutinous rice grown in yellow loess and harvested from Korea.

Hence, sticky rice was a healthy food, and kochujang made by mixing sticky rice with maeju powder and fermenting it after adding the proper amount of soy sauce and salt made for a feast fit for a king.

Soy sauce is also made by placing maeju in salt water with a salt concentration of 10 percent and floating wood charcoal on the surface. Aerobic microorganisms then ferment the water into soy sauce. Soy sauce was also applied as an antibiotic to blisters left by contact with poisonous plants.

Kochujang is an essential ingredient in the majority of Korean culinary delights. The red pepper plants grown and dried in the sun in the mountainous areas in Kyongsang-pukto and Imsil in Cholla-pukto, have a hot and sweet taste and are a prized product.

Lee Won-sup, who writes this biweekly column

in collaboration with Times staff reporter Jang

Jae-il, is president of Yangmyonghoe, a group of

scholars and farmers who try to revive traditional

esoteric methods of achieving health and longevity.

He has his own homepage at <http://www.tao-healing.com/>

or you can call him at (0343) 393-3620.