Jajang Bolognese
Two of my favorite dishes, jajang myeon and bolognese, come together in this hearty and flavorful bowl of comforting rigatoni. This dish is the definition of comfort food for me! A perfect balance of Korean and Italian flavors clinging to al dente noodles with so much depth of flavor!
The Inspiration for this Recipe
Jajangmyeon translates fried sauce(jajang) noodles(myeon) and it’s a Chinese Korean fusion dish. I thought I would add a little Italian to the mix by translating the jajang into a bolognese. Typically jajang uses chunks of pork but I went with ground to mimic the bolognese texture. Then I cut all the veggies about half the size as they typically would be in jajang to mimic the aromatics in bolognese. Bolognese would probably have onion, carrot, and maybe celery. I used the jajang ingredients of radish, zucchini, potato, and onion. The bean paste is the most important ingredient in jajangmyeon, so i mixed it with tomato paste to really bring the two dishes together.
Start the sauce
First cook the pork, then remove it from the pan. Next cook the veggies. Potato and onion first, then zucchini and radish after.
Next add garlic, ginger, sesame oil, ad gochugaru. Then add the pork back to the pan.
All the veggies and meat are browned and delicious, time to sauce it up!
Continue cooking the jajang bolognese
I debated for a while if I would add tomato paste to this, or only add the black bean paste. The main question is do I want this to taste mostly like jajangmyeon, or do I want it to taste like jajang and bolognese combined. I ended up adding tomato paste and I honestly regretted it for the next 10 minutes. The flavors seemed like they were fighting each other. When I finally mixed it with the sauce, It all came together perfectly and I realized I made the right choice!
The tomato paste also allowed me to skip the cornstarch cause it all thickened on it’s own. Toss the pasta in a bowl with the sauce and add in some pasta cooking water. Toss it all together and it’s ready to serve!
Serve the jajang bolognese
Get it into bowls and top with some sliced cucumber and gochugaru.
I also drizzled on a little more sesame oil. So good! Like I said, pure comfort in a bowl! The flavors of bolognese and jajang were perfectly balanced in my opinion and worked together to form something new and tasty!
Twists on jajang bolognese
You could top this with some parmesan cheese too if you wanted. You could also omit the tomato paste or trade it for gochujang but I was really happy with the flavors of the tomato paste.
If you are looking for a classic jajangmyeon recipe, this is my favorite.
For more twists on jajangmyeon, check out my jajangmyeon rasta pasta, or this jajangmyeon burger!
Jajang Bolognese
Ingredients
- olive oil
- 1 pound ground pork
- salt and pepper
- 3/4 cup diced potatoes
- 3/4 cup diced onion
- 3/4 cup diced diakon radish
- 3/4 cup diced zucchini
- 5 cloves garlic minced
- 2 inches ginger minced
- 1/4 cup sesame oil
- 1/2 teaspoon gochugaru plus more for garnish
- 3 ounces tomato paste (half a small can)
- 1/4 cup black bean paste
- 1.5 cups water
- 2 tablespoons soy sauce
- 1 pound rigatoni
- sliced cucumbers
Instructions
- Put a large frying pan over medium high heat and add a little oil and the pork. Season with salt and pepper. Cook on medium high heat for about 8 minutes to brown and break up. Transfer to a bowl. Keep some of the fat in the pan and discard excess fat if needed.
- Add the potato and onion to the pan and continue to cook on medium high, stirring occasionally, Season with a little salt but use caution because there are salty ingredients in the sauce. Cook about 10 minutes until browning on the edges.
- Add the zucchini and radish and cook another 6-8 minutes until all the veggies have reduced in size, softened, and lightly browned.
- Add in the garlic and ginger along with 1 tablespoon of the sesame oil and the gochugaru. Cook 3 minutes. Add the pork back in and stir to combine.
- Add in the tomato and bean pastes and cook 3 minutes, stirring the pastes into the veggies and meat.
- Add in the water and bring to a simmer. Turn to low. Cook about 10 minutes.
- At this point, you can also put on a pot of heavily salted water for the pasta.
- Cook the pasta to package instructions. Just before straining the pasta, reserve 1/2 cup of the pasta cooking water.
- Remove the sauce from the heat and stir in the remaining sesame oil as well as the soy sauce.
- Strain the pasta and quickly pour the sauce over it. Add the reserved pasta cooking liquid. Stir to combine the pasta and the sauce.
- Serve the pasta and top with sliced cucumbers and gochugaru.