Hi everybody!

Spring has come! It’s time for us to make something delicious, pack a lunch box, and go on a picnic.

I can’t fully enjoy any activity or event unless delicious food is on hand. Most Koreans are like this. I may spend one afternoon in Central Park here in New York, but before I do, I need to make gimbap. Packed with some water and an apple, my outing is more exciting knowing that it’s in my bag waiting for me. Oh, don’t forget some napkins and chopsticks!

If you do this, think about me when you unwrap your gimbap and sit down to eat! I’ll give you an imaginary compliment!

Korean seaweed rice rolls (Gimbap: 김밥)

Basically, gimbap is a seaweed rice roll made of gim (a sheet of dried seaweed) and bap (rice). So as long as you can roll some rice in gim, you can say: “Check out the gimbap that I made!”

For fillings, you can use chopped kimchi if you’re in a hurry, or make a classic gimbap like I do in this video. This recipe uses many colorful ingredients: carrot, eggs, danmuji, spinach (or cucumber), and beef. It takes a little longer to prepare. You can replace spinach with salted cucumber sticks, carrots with imitation crab sticks (or sliced and sauteed red bell pepper), and beef with sausage or ham.

This recipe is a very authentic, classic style gimbap that I used to eat and make all the time. Gimbap can be made with all kinds of fillings, and I like almost all of them, except for a few like mayonnaise. I like mayonnaise in my potato salad and in my sandwich, but not in my gimbap. I just don’t like the greasy texture.

You may be wondering: “Maangchi, how come you didn’t post this classic gimbap sooner?”

Yes, years ago, I posted my tuna gimbap recipe with a tuna and avocado based filling. I’d been using this recipe for years, even before YouTube was invented, and every time I took it to a party, it was always a big hit. The filling is my own invention – tuna stir-fried with soy sauce, garlic, ground black pepper, and sugar.

So when I wanted to shoot a gimbap video, I chose it because I thought you guys would love it. But I always wanted to do a classic gimbap video too, so here it is!

I’ve been making and eating this classic gimbap for years, much longer than my tuna gimbap. It’s something that my mom used to make for me for my school picnic. Whenever the picnic was announced, the first thing to come into my mind was this delicious gimbap! On that day everyone brings gimbap from home, shares a bite with their friends, and tries to figure out which gimbap tastes better. We sat in the grass on the side of the mountain and shared our gimbap and other snacks like sweet candy, yang-gaeng, dried squid, peanuts, boiled chestnuts, and hard-boiled eggs with salt. Great times!

Many moms also send off their kids with an extra gimbap for their teachers, to express their thanks for the teacher’s hard work. You can imagine, some teachers end up with a lot of gimbap! Because it should be consumed that day, they usually share them with other teachers, or give them to students who didn’t bring their own gimbap. What a touching story.

All right, enough of the long introduction. My stories go on and on when I talk about certain food. : )

This is the recipe, let’s get serious!

Ingredients: (serves 2-3 : 5 rolls)

  • 5 sheets of gim (seaweed paper), roasted slightly (sometimes called “nori” from Japanese)
  • 4 cups cooked rice (the recipe is here, but make with 2 cups of short grain rice instead of 1 cup)
  • ½ pound beef skirt steak (or tenderloin, or ground beef)
  • 1 large carrot, cut into matchsticks (about 1½ cup)
  • 5 strips of yellow pickled radish (use pre-cut danmuji or cut into 8 inch long strips)
  • 8  to 10 ounces spinach (1 small bunch), blanched, rinsed in cold water, and strained
  • 3 eggs
  • 3 garlic cloves
  • 2 teaspoons soy sauce
  • 1 tablespoon plus 1 teaspoon brown (or white) sugar
  • 1½ teaspoon kosher salt
  • 2½ tablespoons toasted sesame oil
  • vegetable oil

Directions

Rice:

  1. Place freshly made rice in a large, shallow bowl. Gently mix in ½ teaspoon kosher salt and 2 teaspoons toasted sesame oil over top with a rice scoop or a wooden spoon.
  2. Let it cool down enough so it’s no longer steaming. Cover and set aside.

Spinach:

gimbap spinach

  1. Combine the blanched spinach, 2 minced garlic cloves, ½ teaspoon kosher salt, and 2 teaspoons toasted sesame oil in a bowl.
  2. Mix well by hand and put it on a large platter with the sliced yellow pickled radish.

Carrots:

  1. Combine the carrot matchsticks with ¼ teaspoon kosher salt. Mix well and let it sweat for 5 to 10 minutes. Heat a pan and add a few drops vegetable oil.
  2. Squeeze out excess water from the carrot, then saute for about 1 minute. Put it on the platter next to the spinach.

gimbap carrot

Steaks:

  1. Trim the fat from the skirt steaks and slice into ¼ inch wide, 3 to 5 inch strips. Put the strips into a bowl. Add 2 teaspoons soy sauce, 1 minced garlic clove, ¼ teaspoon ground black pepper,1 tablespoon plus 1 teaspoon brown (or white) sugar, and 2 teaspoons toasted sesame oil.
    gimbap seasoned beef
  2. Mix well by hand.
  3. Set aside, and let them marinate while we do the egg strips.

Eggs:

  1. Crack 3 eggs in a bowl and add ¼ teaspoon kosher salt. Beat it with fork and remove the stringy chalaza.
  2. Drizzle a few drops of oil on a heated 10 to 12 inch non-stick pan. Wipe off the excess with a paper towel so only a thin sheen of oil remains. Turn down the heat to low and pour the egg mixture into the pan. Spread it into a large circle so it fills the pan.
    gimbap egg filling
  3. When the bottom of the egg is cooked, flip it over with a spatula. Remove from the heat and let it cook slowly in the hot pan for about 5 minutes, with the ultimate goal of keeping the egg as yellow as possible, and not brown.
  4. Cut it into ½ inch wide strips. Put it next to the spinach on the platter.

kimbap fillings

Finish steaks:

  1. Heat up a pan over medium high heat and cook the marinated beef, stirring it with a wooden spoon until well cooked.
    beef filling for gimbap
  2. Set aside.

Let’s roll gimbap!

  1. Place a sheet of gim on a bamboo mat with the shiny side down. Evenly spread about ¾ cup of cooked rice over top of it, leaving about 2 inches uncovered on one side of the gim.
  2. Place beef, carrot, yellow pickled radish strip, a few egg strips, and spinach in the center of the rice.
    gimbap making
  3. Use both hands to roll the mat (along with gim and rice) over the fillings, so one edge of the rice and gim reaches the opposite edge. This centers the fillings in the roll, so they’ll be nicely in the middle when you slice it.
  4. Grab the mat with both hands and and press it tightly as you continue rolling the gimbap. Push out the mat as you roll, so it doesn’t get wrapped in the gimbap.
    rolling gimbaprolling gimbap rolling gimbap
  5. Remove the roll from the mat at the end and set the finished roll aside with the seam down, to seal it nicely.
  6. Repeat 4 more times with the remaining ingredients.
  7. Put some toasted sesame oil on the finshed rolls and sprinkle some sesame seeds over top. Cut each roll into ¼ inch bite size pieces with a sharp knife, occasionally wiping it with a wet paper towel or cloth to clean the starch off and to ease cutting.
    Gimbap rolls
  8. Put it on a plate and serve immediately or pack it in a lunchbox.

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167 Comments:

  1. aluma joined 9/23 & has 3 comments

    My first time making (and eating) gimbap and this recipe was so fun and easy to follow. Thank you!

  2. Beckaroosy United States joined 7/22 & has 1 comment

    I was planning on making this for my bento box so it will be eaten cold. Is it safe to eat this cold? I keep reading that you need to put rice vinegar or something to keep bacteria from growing on cold rice.

  3. Smiley.faced Mississippi, USA joined 5/22 & has 1 comment

    It’s so delicious!! Thank you for giving us these recipes because we never knew how much we loved Korean food! We made it vegetarian.


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  4. mickeystew New Zealand joined 4/22 & has 1 comment

    Loved this recipe so much! Tried kimbap the first time a few weeks back and couldn’t wait to try make it! Tastes just like the real deal


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  5. izabela s România joined 4/22 & has 1 comment

    I made again your recipe after long time and I enjoy it with my family. When I kook korean I think of you. Thank you for sharing your recipes


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  6. Elli14 Norway joined 11/21 & has 2 comments

    Made this today! I’m so happy with how they turned out. With some homemade kimchi on the side. Thanks, your recipes are always so nice and easy to follow!


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  7. Elaine W Halifax joined 2/22 & has 3 comments

    Very delicious, thanks for your recipes.


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  8. AKAPete Waterlooville (UK) joined 1/22 & has 1 comment

    Just used this recope to try and have a go at making Gimbap as never tried it before, And the results were amazing recipe was easy to follow and even tweaked it to do a veggie version for a friend at work. Thank for the recipe look forward to getting your recipe book to try more


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  9. ChrisG New York joined 9/21 & has 3 comments

    I made Maangchi’s Gimbap! I followed it exactly except I made my own Korean style pickled radish. Thank you for the recipe!


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  10. MaangchiLove Montreal, Toronto joined 8/19 & has 59 comments
  11. mariacamille Philippines joined 6/20 & has 1 comment

    I made these today, Maangchi. This was a hit with my family! I didn’t have the rectangular lunch box, so I used an old cake container. Though I experimented a bit by adding a touch of 현미식초 when seasoning the rice (forgive me, Maangchi )


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  12. donn Southeast Asia joined 5/20 & has 1 comment

    made mine with brown rice.. and it’s so delish… making it again this week..


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  13. Sjoh213 Huntsville, AL joined 1/19 & has 2 comments

    Can you make a kimchi kimbap with this recipe? I used to eat this kimchi kimbap at my favorite korean restaurant, but they remove this particular kimbap off the menu.

  14. Ara.k New York joined 4/20 & has 1 comment

    I was wondering if instead of the steak skirt, could you substitute other things like tuna or something?

  15. WishfulsoUl Oslo joined 3/20 & has 17 comments

    Been making gimbap few times already and it’s fun to make. I find it very relaxing being in the kitchen and play with different colors of the food am making and this recipe is just one of those creations I never dared to try yet with a bit of courage and whisper to own’s self ”you can do it” (hahaha) then you’ll be just so happy to see the outcome.

  16. nhungsophia Frankfurt, Germany joined 4/20 & has 1 comment

    안녕하새요 Maangchi 씨,

    I want to try this 김밥 recipe and also bought the pickled radish from the Korean grocery store. However, I would not use the whole package for one time gimbap so how can I store the radish after opening?

    Best regards,
    Nhung

  17. Hula Girl Kauai, Hawaii joined 1/20 & has 2 comments

    My first time making gimbab. Your recipe and instructions are spot on. My family loves K-Dramas and now I can make fun snacks to enhance the experience. Kamsahamnida, Maangchi!


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