‘Say Kimchi! Korean Food Comic’ gets first release

The first part of the “Say Kimchi! Korean Food Comic” has been released on iPad for those wanting a guide to Korean cooking that is easy on the eye.

The comic series published by O’ngo, a cooking school and culinary tourism company in Seoul, explains local dishes to Korean food novices, but goes beyond a simple recounting of bibimbap and galbi.

Instead the series looks to include dishes that have unusual aspects to them or interesting stories behind them ― did you know, for example, that Andong “jjimdak” was developed in the 1980s to compete with the rising tide of fried chicken restaurants?

A screen capture from the “Say Kimchi! Korean Food Comic”

There are eight chapters, including sections on “hotteok” and “goldfish bread,” “yukhoe” (raw beef), and “hwangtae gui” (braised pollock), although the bonus section on Korean table etiquette has perhaps more value as a point of interest than a practical guide.

Additional notes on how the foods are made and cultural features of Korea such as “jjimjilbang” sauna complexes can be accessed through “learn more” snippets on the pages.

Dan Gray, one of the authors of the book and a co-owner of O’ngo, expects the next edition to be available by the end of this month.

There are due to be three installments of the comic, and Gray said that the first had been doing better than expected, with some publishers in the United States looking to publish the full set in a paper edition.

“A lot of people have contacted us to tell us it’s very helpful,” he said.

He said an application version for Android and iOS was planned, but that the dates and whether or not it would be paid-for or free to download had not yet been decided.

The book was partly paid for through crowd-funding, but non-backers can buy Volume 1 via the iBook store.

By Paul Kerry (paulkerry@heraldcorp.com)