After visiting Korea, many of our guests like to email us to ask us what ingredients they can get to add a Korean accent to their meals. So today I will talk to you about the foundations of Korean flavors and how you can recreate your own Korean meal at home.

First of all, you should get some jangs or the fermented flavoring foods. Jangs include, the liquid and the solid flavoring components. Kanjang or soy sauces include Jin Kanjang or dark soy sauce and guk kanjang or light soy sauce. Typically, Koreans use the dark soy sauce for most of the dishes except for something like soups. Korean soy sauce tends to have a more robust flavor than other nation's brands.

The solid jangs I am talking about are the soy bean paste, red chili paste and the ssamjang. In your Korean grocery store, you will find these in plastic, color coded tubs. Red is for red chili paste, brown is for soy bean paste and the green is for ssamjang. Ssamjang is a mix of soy bean paste, sesame seed oil, and some red chili paste. It is the sauce you put on your lettuce leaf and then wrap your meat in. It can be used as a dip for vegetables such as cucumbers, carrots and chilies. It's pretty versatile stuff. If you can't get it though, you can make it by mixing the soy bean paste with the red chili paste.

Ok, now that we have the jangs out of the way, we need to get some Korean dark sesame oil. Korean sesame oil is toasted before being pressed so it has a wonderful nutty accent that is essential when flavoring side dishes, salads or as a seasoning to stir-fries.

Korean red chili flakes are also very important. They have a medium level of heat and have course ground to it. It shouldn't be too finely ground, nor should it have seeds. The red chili flakes add the fire to Korean dishes and not the red chili paste as some might believe. It is essential when adding spice to stir-fries and soups.

Other essential seasonings to your Korean kitchen are sesame seeds and salt. Sesame seeds are used as a garnish for many dishes. It can be toasted and ground up to add a savory, nutty accent to Korean dishes. Salt is important here for Korean salt is sea salt. It is not very salty like iodized salt. It is used as a way to preserve vegetables and to add flavor.

Oh, and don’t forget vinegar. Koreans tend to use rice wine vinegar to add zest to salads. You can also add it to red chili paste to make a dip for raw fish or as a salad dressing.

So other main ingredients you should have is garlic, green onions, and ginger. Think of these as the trinity of seasonings and they play a big part in flavoring Korean meals. With the foundations of what I just talked about, you can add Korean accents to your meals. You can combine red chili paste, sesame oil, garlic and ginger to make a delicious braising sauce you can add to chicken. You can barbecue meat and then have a dipping sauce of sesame oil and salt and then make veggie wraps with lettuce, ssamjang and garlic. You can blanch vegetables like bean sprouts, spinach, bracken and eggplant and season them with some garlic and sesame oil. Or simply make a salad and drizzle it is a red chili paste and vinegar dressing.

The possibilities are endless.