Maangchi - You Tube's Top Chef

You Tube has given the world some amazing phenomenon since its' inception. There was Justin Beiber and those make up and hair whizzes  . Cooking, though has a few, but none as famous as Maangchi  aka Emily Kim. This Korean born home chef has turned her love of cooking into interesting tutorials for Korean cuisine lovers and other home chefs  Best of all, she's written a cookbook with her recipes that fans can copy and enjoy.

Chef Kim was interviewed in today's New York Times Food section by weekly contributor , Julia Moskin. Surprisingly she  didn't start off with cooking but rather gaming. Maangchi was actually the name of her avatar when she played City of Heroes. Her children urged her to another Internet activity, cooking videos. It was needed. According to Ms Kim, most Korean food videos were riddled with mistakes. someone had to amend that and she did, She has 619,000 YouTube followers , more than master chefs Ina Garten, Alton Brown and Martha Stewart.It lead to her newest cookbook "Maangchi' s Real Korean Cooking" (Rux Martin/Houghton Mifflin Publishng). fans not only tune into to watch her prepare classics such as the tasty beef bolgoki  and Korean fried chicken but to check out her lavish make up, tiaras, and leatherette shorts, Sometimes she'll sport fascinators , those funny hats worn at William and Kate's wedding but also rubber gloves tricked out with bling.. All her videos show her dashing around in four inch platforms. a  feat for anyone, let alone a busy cook,

Ms/ Kim was raised in Yeosu, a port city on the southernmost tip of the Korean peninsula. She came to the States in 1992 when her husband took a teaching job in Columbia Missouri This put her smack in the middle of the American Midwest where Asian food was mostly Chinese and catered to mid American tastes. She cooked for the Korean families that she counselled, giving them a much mossed taste of home.. Fast forward to her life now in Manhattan  to anew husband and a new career. Her videos and I have watched a few) are interesting and come with cute  and informative graphics. Anyone can follow them , even the most novice of home chefs. There are videos on the ancient art of fermenting used in making kim chee along with making gochujang or chile paste and doenjang  soybean paste.. This last requires salt and hay along with an electric blanket and a year to ferment. Easier recipes include the flavorful beef dish, the afore mentioned bolgoki, a chopped beef dish that features pears, sesame seeds and garlic cloves. There is also ssamjang the spicy Korean barbecue sauce, a marriage of the fiery , savory and sweet. This is perfect for any American  dish from ribs to wings.

There are a million You Tube stars but none shine as brightly as Maangcha or Emily Kim. Her easy to follow cooking demos are fun and informative. Her cookbook is going to shine just as brightly too.