Sheet-Pan Bibimbap

Straight gochuchang is very thick and not usually served without thinning with other ingredients. Gochuchang is mixed with soy sauce, sesame oil, rice vinegar, sugar and minced garlic to make the sauce that is mixed into bibimbap. Just google bibimbap gochuchang sauce. Or more simply, just mix with water and sesame oil.

For the gochuchang, you want to make a sauce (don't use the straight paste!): 2 to 3 tablespoons gochujang paste 1½ tablespoons rice vinegar 1 tablespoon sesame oil 1 tablespoon maple syrup You can also add a splash of soy sauce.

I like to press cold, cooked rice into a large, very hot cast iron skillet that’s been coated with sesame oil; I turn the heat down and allow it to crisp, evenly divide and place in heated bowls, then fry the eggs in the same skillet.

@Euphemia: To add to my previous note: Traditionally, the crisp rice layer is produced by placing the rice in a fairly heavy and very hot (e.g., oven-heated) stone/ceramic serving bowl, pressing the rice down to ensure good thermal contact. The bowl, whose material has high specific heat, yields its heat to the rice layer sustainedly. This technique requires some care by both the cook and the diner not to burn themselves: the low-slow method, used in Iranian chelo rice, avoids this risk.

This is a really interesting recipe! In response to another comment pointing out how the browned, crusty rice in bibimbap is made, transitional Korean cooking doesn’t use oven. It’s all done on a stove top, in a thick stone pot for that delicious browned rice on the bottom - called nooroongji. I grew up in Korea and I didn’t start using my oven regularly years into moving to US. But this recipe seems brilliant. I’m all for seeing recipes that mix different cuisines and techniques.

@Euphemia - You're right that a quick steam (or microwaving) would separate the clumps of leftover rice into separate grains. But Step 3's heating the resultant rice in a sheet pan for 3-6 minutes to set the egg whites would not produce crisp rice crust, if that's your intention. Crust formation, a combination of caramelization (mostly) plus Maillard reaction, requires slow (20 min+) and low (3/10 on an electric stovetop) heat using a non-stick or oiled/buttered pan.

Eggs cooked on a sheet pan are actually really good. I add the egg(s) for the last 5 min or so of roasting. The pan is already hot so it doesn’t run and the quality of the sheet pan cooked egg is superb because of the heat on both sides. The best, honestly. Just test the cooking time obviously, learn your oven for this. Mine would probably eviscerate kale at 450 for that long , on topic of oven varieties LOL

Although not traditional, this sounds interesting. Having said that, I'd point out that bibimbap is mixed with gochujang sauce, not straight up gochujang. Gochujang sauce has mixture of sugar, garlic, vinegar and for me, mirin. If you don't want to make it, you can purchase ready made bibimbap sauce pretty easily at Korean supermarkets. Just keep it in the fridge like ketchup and whenever you like, add it to a bowl of rice. Even with just a fried egg and sesame oil, it's pretty good.

This is now my new favorite clean out the fridge meal! A sweet potato, a handful of kale, a quarter cabbage, some aging carrots, and a zucchini. Fried some tofu cubes, too. Made Maangchi's "vinegared soy-hot pepper paste seasoning sauce". Crisping the rice was a huge favorite - made a big pot of brown rice in the pressure cooker then spread it out immediately on a hot sheet pan where it crisped wonderfully. Served with kimchi and cucumbers and some shredded raw cabbage with lime & gochugaru.

Re: straight gochujang vs. gochujang sauce. This is a matter of preference and there's not one more "authentic" way than the other. Half of my Korean family prefers the sauce and the other half will always opt for straight gochujang. Of course, if you want to go with simple gochujang, it helps to have smooth home-made gochujang instead of the BRICK that I've had in my fridge forever.

Eggs are protein

Next time I would double the veggies and use both sheet pans for cooking them if I want four servings. Then I can avoid cooking the rice and eggs in a sheet pan and just crisp the rice in a heated cast iron and quickly fry the eggs in a nonstick pan instead. Also making the gochujang sauce someone else recommended was definitely worth it over thick paste form.

We loved this but we certainly did not have crispy rice. For my oven, next time I will cook the rice longer and put the eggs in for just two or three minutes. The eggs cooked much faster than the rice warmed/crisped.

RE: protein -- mykoreankitchen.com/bibimbap-korean-mixed-rice-with-meat-and-assorted-vegetables/ uses ground beef (25-30g/person, you can increase it). The basic Korean flavor combination of soy sauce, sesame (both oil and seeds), sugar and garlic in the recipe works for any meat or even firm tofu; just cut the meat thinly so that it cooks quickly.

I would think that we should probably trust the Korean on the straight up gochujang add. Most traditional Korean restaurants serve it straight up on the side. The recipe is delicious as is. Thank you Eric. <3