A Study on the Cooking in 'The Lee's UmsikBup'

"이씨(李氏)음식법"의 조리에 관한 분석적 고찰

It is not known that when and by whom 'The Lee's UmsikBup' was written. This cookbook is written purely in Korean and has not been published yet. There is another book named 'UmsikBup' in the cookbooks of the Chosun Dynasty and there are many books with similar names. So this book is tentatively named 'The Lee's UmsikBup'. This book comprises fifty three items, among which there are fifteen items of rice alcoholics, three items of Gook-Su (noodles), sixteen items of side dishes, seventeen items of Tuck (rice cakes) and Guaja(kookies), and two items of fruit punch and tea. Three items were illegible because the lines were erased or the letters were not clear. The cereals needed for making rice alcoholics were sixty four percent regular rice and thirty six percent sticky rice. As for the processes, the process using Jee-ae-bop took up fifty five percent. As for side dishes, pheasants, which are seldom used for food these days, were then popular for food. And the entrails of domestic animals were much used for food. Seeing that red pepper paste mixed with vinegar was used for steamed breams (Jim) and that red pepper was used for Yeolgooja Tang, we can estimate that this book was written after red pepper was introduced. Inferring that Chohong Chang (red pepper paste mixed with vinegar and honey) is found Jinchan Ye Que, we can estimate this book was written in the late 1800's. The cereals used for making rice cakes were ninety two percent sticky rice and eight percent regular rice. Sticky rice was much more used and pepper was used for making Tuck (rice cakes) as Hun Chal Byung, So Ham Byung and Dootum Tuck. The analysis of the terms used in this book revealed that 117 items were used for cooking processes. And it also showed us that there were six kinds of cutting and thirteen kinds of heating procedure. The shapes and sizes of foods were revealed on the basis of real things. The measuring units are hard to revive since the measurements were taken by the container then in use. Thirty four kinds of containers and cookers, twenty more of which are now in use, were used for preparing foods. The use of ‘twigs stretched for the east’ had no scientific base but said something of Korean folkways at that time.