Vegan Gosari-Namul (Sauteed fern-bracken) Recipe

It’s been a while since I did a namul post. So, here is another one for the namul series!

Namul is the Korean macrobiotic way of using minimal spices and sauces to create yummy dishes with vegetables and weeds that grow in the fields. This one is namul banchan made of gosari (fern bracken). Gosari has a lot of calcium and detoxes the inner organs of your body. Koreans also use gosari for insomnia, and Native Americans even used gosari for bronchitis!

Gosari-namul goes great with other namuls, like a mix of moo-namul, kong-namul, chwi-namul, marun-hobak-namul, and shigumchi namul. And all the different colors of white, yellow, green, look very pretty together.

The spread of various namuls are particularly popular on the Korean traditional holiday Dong-jit-nal (the day of the year when daylight is shortest and night is longest), Koreans eat a spread of various namuls and sweet red bean porridge. Mmm… the thought of Dong-jit-nal makes me crave sweet red bean porridge as well!

Vegan Gosari-namul (Sauteed fern-bracken) Recipe

Ingredients:
1/2 bag of dried fern bracken (or 1 bag of boiled fern bracken)
1 Tbsp of garlic, minced
2 chopped scallions
2 Tbsp of soy sauce
2 Tbsp of sesame oil
1 tsp of sesame seeds
some fresh ground black pepper
several pinches of salt

Directions:
1. If dried, boil the fern bracken for 30 minutes. You want it to be chewy but neither too tough nor too mushy. Then soak in cold water overnight. (If freshly packed in water, start from step 2)
2. Rinse and wash the fern bracken well multiple times so there is no more brown water coming out (it will be bitter if you don’t wash it well), and cut into 3 inch pieces.
3. Add fern bracken, salt, black pepper, garlic, soy sauce, scallions, and sesame oil into a bowl and mix well.
4. Heat a wok/pan and stir fry on high for several minutes.
5. Add a little water, cover with a lid and cook for 10-20 minutes until tender.
6. Remove the lid and stir mixture again for a while so it’s not too watery (a little bit of water is okay).
7. Remove from heat and add sesame seeds and mix well. Taste to see if you need more soy sauce, sesame oil or a sprinkle of salt.
8. It’s ready, serve with rice and other banchan! Again, as any namul banchan, it is great as a main ingredient in bibimbap as well, enjoy!

Boil gosari around 30 minutes, so it’s not too tough or too mushy.

Soak the cooked gosari in cold water overnight.

Add the ingredients, more or less according to your taste – and mix well.

Make sure to use your sohn-maht (Korean hand taste)! 😉

Mmm…. Another Korean namul dish, so good with rice and any other banchan!