If you’ve ever made the mistake of calculating how much you spend on take-out, then this column is for you. We look at some our favorite and most frequent delivery dishes and figure out how to make them at home. This week, we unpack the internet sensation that is kimbap.

Kimbap is probably not on your go to list of delivery foods — but it should be. Gimbap or Kimbap is a Korean dish made from cooked rice and other ingredients that are rolled in gim—dried sheets of seaweed—and served in bite-sized slices. You can usually find pre-made kimbap next to the checkout or in the take away aisle at your local Korean grocery. Kimbap is different from sushi rolls in that the ingredients are cooked. Usually, kimbap are sliced rolls, but someone figured out an ingenious way to make FOLDED kimbap. Switch out the ingredients to make entirely different flavor profiles. Make it with the kids for fun and hide vegetables in there that they won’t even notice, get rid of left overs, and take it on the road. Korean Bapsong breaks this down in the best way possible. It’s my go-to site for Korean recipes and she’s the Korean grandmother I wish I had! Below are a few of the combinations that we’ve tried.

The Breakdown

You won’t use all of these ingredients entirely in the making of these kimbap. Since these ingredients can be used in tons of other dishes, you’re actually spending less per kimbap if you do the math. All of these ingredients are available at 99 Ranch Market, Marukai, and other Asian food markets in and around Los Angeles.

Gim or Nori ($2.49)
Spam ($4.89)
Eggs
Enoki Mushrooms ($1.09)
Kimchi ($4.89)
Kewpie Mayo ($5.72)
Shirtaki Noodles ($3.19)

By my rough calculations, each kimbap costs less than a dollar to make.

Prepping the Seaweed

This is ridiculously simple. Take a sheet of seaweed. Find the midpoint on the bottom, and slice up halfway to the center of the sheet. Voila, you are ready to go.

Four Fillings

You want to have four varied fillings for each quadrant of the seaweed. Important to note, you don’t want to assemble these ahead of time for a picnic, for example, because the seaweed will get soggy. Make the fillings ahead. Do your mise-en-place and have everyone make their own kimbap.

Hearty Beach Day Combo

I used left over brown rice from another meal and just seasoned it with a bit of sesame oil and rice vinegar. Put the rice or the heaviest part of your fillings on the bottom right if you’re folding clockwise. That way the heaviest part of the sandwich will remain at the bottom and you don’t need to lift it up and flip it at all. Crisp the spam and the enoki mushrooms separately. Make a simple omelette. Put the raw vegetables on top of the omelette to avoid the moisture from the veggies making the seaweed soggy. I would definitely recommend adding a generous squeeze of kewpie to the spam. It’s literally the best mayo in the world because it’s made with only egg yolks (as opposed to whole eggs) and with rice or apple vinegar (with no added sugar or salt). It will add some moisture and “sauce” to the sammie without dripping down your wrists.

Crisped enoki mushrooms
Crisped Spam
Egg omelette with raw cabbage and carrots
Brown rice with sesame oil

Home Ec Improv

I wanted to make this with my kids for home ec since it’s fun. They helped in all the prep and snacked along the way. This was definitely one of the more successful projects. We had no rice so we substituted seasoned shirataki noodles and placed them on lettuce leaves to avoid getting the seaweed soggy. You can dress the vegetables with vinegar or use pickled veggies, but my kids are purists and just like plain carrots. We used a mandolin to get nice thin and crunchy slices. I had my son crisp the mushrooms in a bit of oil and chicken bouillon for seasoning. He would NEVER eat mushrooms under normal circumstances, but making them into little mushroom crispies was fun and he couldn’t stop stealing them from the pan.

Carrot (sliced by mandolin)
Crisped enoki mushrooms
Crisp spam with kewpie
Seasoned shirataki noodles on lettuce

Late Night Kimbap

It was late, we still had seaweed left, and I scrounged some other left overs out of the bottom of the fridge. Add some kimchi for some funk and spice. I happened to have fish cakes at the bottom of my fridge, but you could substitute anything at all. Maybe you happen to have leftover bulgogi, fried tofu, barbecue, pickled vegetables? Another great late night combo or pantry raid combo could be canned tuna with mayo, cucumber on lettuce, pickled radish, and rice. Or simply ham, sliced cheese, omelette, and rice. Like a late night breakfast kimbap? These folded kimbap are literally the perfect vehicle for late night snacking and stacking.

Carrot (sliced by mandolin)
Crisped enoki mushrooms
Sliced fish cake
Seasoned shirataki noodles and kimchi on lettuce

Disclaimer: Unpacking Take-Out is an amateur’s attempt at reverse engineering things that we love to order in. These are approximations of actual recipes. Be advised that Haily is not a pro so don’t be mad if these recipes don’t work out exactly. She documents her food adventures semi-regularly on @theweeknighter.

The Genius of Folded Kimbap