By E.J. Papa
Reno, NV - What do you know about Korean cuisine? Could you name any type of Korean cuisine? How about this, do you know what ‘bibimbap’ is? Much to my surprise not many college students knew what in the world I was talking about.
When I was first introduced to Korean cuisine I too had very little knowledge or familiarity with it. I didn't know what it was, what it tasted like, nothing. Then in 2017 I was introduced to Korean cuisine through—Korean BBQ. However I wouldn't say that its the food that made my first time trying Korean cuisine memorable, it was more of the prospect and experience of cooking the meats that were served to you on the table top grill.
However that same year I tried another form of Korean cuisine, bibimbap. Now, what is bibimbap or bap as it's sometimes called. Bap is a Korean dish the consists of rice, vegetables, and a meat. It seems like a fairly simple dish to prepare and serve, but I think this captures a bit more of what Korean cuisine and food is. That the flavor comes from not only the ingredients but also in the preparation.
This dish is the the main focus of Bab Cafe, a Korean Restaurant in downtown Reno with another location at the Summit Shopping Center. Owner of Bab Cafe, Ryu Jihoon, focused on this dish because it captures Korean culture.
" Bibimbap is one of many foods that represent Korean culture, and one of most popular traditional food in Korea. In addition, it has been introduced to US culture in big cities for a long time."
In addition to being a dish that represents the culture, Jihoon also mentioned that he wanted to make his menu simple and accesible, something that bibimbap or in the restaurant's case bibimbab is able to do.
"I was trying to make our menu simple to approach and introduce to people from different cultures. And Bibimbab, Korean rice bowl was the only one which matches to all my ideas."
As a quick aside, the reason why Bab Cafe calls there dish 'bibimbab' is to make it their own and give the restaurant is identity.
While the intention of introducing a simple and approachable dish is great way to introduce more people to Korean culture and cuisine there are still a good amount of people who still don't know about it.
Here are some of the responses I gathered with regards to college students' familiarity or knowledge of 'bap':
Bibi & map
A Migos beat
Someone getting bopped on the head
Korean Beat Boxer
I don't know what this is, but it sounds like a cute animal
It sounds like an word in Korean possibly
Additionally after conducting a survey about 25-26 percent of students were only somewhat familiar with Korean cuisine.
While it may be a long way for Korean style cuisine to be well known in Reno, Bab Cafe does offer a stepping stone to hopefully continue the growth of this particular food culture here and increase the awareness of not only cuisine, but Korean culture as well.
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