Yeongyang-buchu-namul

Fresh garlic chives dressed with a light seasoning of soy sauce, sesame oil, and chili.

Yeongyang-buchu-namul is a raw or very lightly cooked banchan made from garlic chives (buchu), a vegetable whose pungent, deeply herbal flavor sits between garlic and chive and is beloved in Korean cuisine for both its taste and its reputation as a vitality-boosting food. The chives are cut into short segments and dressed simply with soy sauce, sesame oil, vinegar, a touch of gochugaru, and sesame seeds, the dressing intended to highlight rather than mask the chives' natural intensity. In some preparations the chives are briefly blanched to soften their texture and mellow the raw sharpness, while in others they are left entirely raw for maximum herbal punch. The name yeongyang, meaning nutritious, reflects the Korean folk-medicine tradition of classifying buchu as a warm, yang-energy food believed to strengthen the body's vital force, and eating buchu-namul in spring was traditionally associated with recovering energy after the depleting cold of winter. Today the banchan appears regularly on Korean BBQ tables, where its sharp, clean herbal flavor provides a refreshing counterpoint to rich grilled meat.