Samgyeopsal (), samgyeopsal-gui (), or grilled pork belly is a type of gui (grilled dish) in Korean cuisine.
It is the part of the abdomen under the loin from the 5th rib or 6th rib to the hind limb. In Korea, the word samgyeop-sal, meaning "pork belly", often refers to samgyeop-sal-gui (grilled pork belly), in the same way that the word galbi, meaning "ribs", often refers to galbi-gui (grilled beef ribs). Gui refers to roasted, baked, or grilled dishes.
One can also find ogyeopsal (오겹살), with an o meaning "five" and "gyeop" meaning a layer. Ogyeop-sal includes the skin part of the pork belly, unlike samgyeop-sal where the skin is removed.
Until the 1980s, the main type of meat the Koreans preferred was beef, but pork and chicken meat were encouraged at a national policy level as a good alternative as most of the cattle were used for agriculture and thus beef supplies were deficient. In response to government policies, , especially Samsung, started to run pork farms. Samsung later shut down the farms due to backlash from farmers worried that Samsung was attempting real estate speculation.
During the late 1980s to the 1990s, the dish became a popular menu item along with Jokbal and sundae, as Samsung and Lotte entered the meat processing industry. The use of pork in traditional Korean cuisine such as Bossam or jeyuk-bokkeum focused on methods of hiding its smell with strong seasoning using spices such as ginger, garlic, and leek. After the smell problem was solved by scientific methods such as castration of pigs at the production level, the popularization of samgyeopsal became possible. In 1996, "daepae samgyeopsal", a samgyeopsal that is named because it is thinly cut like it was cut by a Plane (a tool to cut wood, called "daepae" in Korean), was invented. The Hoesik culture after the 1998 financial crisis also popularized the dish as part of the South Korean office cuisine. During the 2000s, beoljip samgyeopsal, which was named as such because the way the meat is cut resembled a beehive (beoljip in Korean) appeared. From 2005, the Jeju island culture of providing bigger portions of meat in (a traditional Korean unit that is equivalent to 600g) instead of 100 grams, and the popularization of Jeju Black pig meat influenced the samgyeopsal culture.
The meat is usually neither marinated nor seasoned, although marinated samgyeopsal in flavors such as ginseng, wine, garlic, herbs, curry, doenjang, and gochujang has gained popularity since the late 2000s. Slices of garlic, onions, green chili peppers, mushrooms, and kimchi are often grilled alongside using the fat trickling from the pork belly.
Common accompaniments for samgyeopsal include ssam vegetables such as lettuce, kkaennip (perilla leaves), ssammu (pickled Korean radish paper) and such as ssamjang (made with seasoned mixture of Gochujang and Doenjang) and gireum-jang (made with sesame oil, salt, and black pepper), jangajji (soy sauce-pickled vegetables) such as Allium ochotense-jangajji (pickled Siberian onion leaves) or yangpa-jangajji (pickled onions), kimchi, as well as sliced garlic, , and seasoned shredded . Garlic, onions, and kimchi can be either grilled with the meat or consumed raw with the cooked meat. Mushrooms, such as button mushrooms or oyster mushrooms, are also grilled with the meat.
Cooked rice, stews such as kimchi-jjigae and doenjang-jjigae, as well as naengmyeon (cold noodles), can be served as meals. Sometimes, leftover meat is mixed with rice, gim-garu (seaweed flakes), and seasonings to make bokkeum-bap (fried rice) at the end.
Samgyeopsal is often accompanied by, or accompanying (as anju) shots of soju. Somaek, a simple cocktail made by dumping a shot of soju into a glass of beer, is also a popular beverage consumed with samgyeopasal.
There is a myth in South Korea that eating samgyeopsal protects humans from air pollution by particulates (). This is thought to have originated from the practice of Korean miners eating pork after an intensive mining operation. Contrary to the myth, samgyeopsal can rather help the absorption of chemicals in the particulates that are soluble in oil.
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