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So what’s better than a big jar of kimchi? When it spins and moves, of course.

It is tempting to post a consecutive string of stop-motion clips of various sights because, well, they’re so fun to make.

I was ready to move on to other types of postings since I made stop-motion clips of a larger-than-normal chess match and Snoqualmie Falls in the past few days.

But then, I spotted a pretty big jar of kimchi at a local Korean grocery store. We’ve bought seaweed salad, seasoned squid and kimchi there before. My wife suggested that I buy more kimchi. This $10 jar seemed to fit our needs. We didn’t have any and it was an easy move to replenish our supply.

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South Korea’s kimchi “master” takes odor out of dish. Wasn’t that part of the fun?

I just bought a jar of hot American-made kimchi. I enjoy eating the spicy, pickled cabbage, particularly when it’s kimchi tofu.

So, this Los Angeles Times story certainly resonated with me.

Get this: South Korea’s first kimchi “master” Kim Soon-ja reportedly has succeeded in making the garlicky aroma disappear from the centuries-old food.

Reporter Ju-min Park explains that Kim has invented a way to freeze-dry the kimchi and that adding water produces no pungent odor.

But, yes, yes. Let’s say it. We need to say it: Wait!

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CHOW posts kimchi and tofu recipe

Over at CHOW, you can find a recently posted recipe for kimchi and tofu, a popular dish for many Koreans.

It’s delicious because it mixes coolness, heat and spice together. I ate a version more than a decade ago when I was in South Korea to celebrate the wedding of my friend, Norm.

The CHOW dish calls for pork belly. I like meat. But with this dish, I prefer tuna.

In May, I posted a quick note about how Norm and I – who are both from North America – came across this dish.

In my post, I linked to another tofu kimchi recipe from the blog, KoreanHomeCooking.

UPDATE: Chow also has a great tofu discussion here.

Kimchi tofu: A bean curd flashback

When I eat, I typically equate a hot food dish with heat. Likewise, I consider a cold dish to be more or less cool throughout.

That seems like basic logic. But in 1998, a simple but tasty Korean dish reminded me again of how my senses react when hot and cold meet and combine.

I was introduced to a plate of stir-fried kimchi with tofu and tuna.

My friend from Canada, Norm, was getting married in South Korea, his fiancee’s home country. He and I met in Guangzhou, China two years earlier. We studied at the same language school.

At the time of his wedding, I was working on Guam and flew in for the celebration. He and his fiancee planned on a large banquet in Canada later that year. So, I was his only friend for the Korean-style nuptials.

On the eve before his wedding, we didn’t really know where to go to mark this happy moment. We ended up heading to a neighborhood bar.

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