The best dishes for busy weeknights are the ones like Korean Bulgogi that you can make by putting a few super flavorful marinade ingredients into a bowl, and letting them do their magic until you're ready to cook in all of 10 minutes. Subtly sweet, garlicky, gingery and full of umami, Korean Bulgogi is a fast and easy staple. Shall we?
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What is Bulgogi?
Bulgogi is a Korean dish of thin slices of steak, marinated in a a subtly sweet, garlicky, gingery soy-based sauce, then grilled or pan-seared quickly over high heat.
If you've ever gone out to restaurant for Korean BBQ and have seen the semi-frozen rolled up slices of beef, bulgogi is that same super-thin cut, but marinated before cooking.
Because bulgogi meat is cut so thin, it's faster to marinate and to cook, so it's great for a quick, easy meal at home.
Here's your Korean language lesson of the week:
Bulgogi 불고기, broken down into its components, is "bul" 불 which means “fire,” and gogi 고기 which means “meat.”
Essentially, translates to “fire meat.”
Health and Dietary Considerations of Bulgogi
As printed, this Bulgogi recipe is:
- dairy-free
- gluten-free when using gluten-free soy sauce or tamari
- refined sugar-free
Obviously, beef is a protein powerhouse. Depending on the cut of steak, one serving of this dish can have anywhere from 45 to 48 grams of protein!
Ingredients You Need for Bulgogi
Refrigerator/fresh ingredients:
- Ribeye, strip, or top sirloin steak, cut into paper-thin slices 2 pounds
- Garlic
- Ginger
- Green onions
Pantry/dry ingredients:
- Tamari or soy sauce
- Beef stock or bone broth
- Maple syrup
- Sesame oil
- Avocado oil or other neutral oil for cooking
- Toasted sesame seeds for garnish
What Kind of Meat for Bulgogi?
Use ribeye, strip, or top sirloin steak for Bulgogi. Ribeye has more marbling and flavor (and thus, more expensive), strip is in the middle, and sirloin is the leanest (and less expensive).
You want a cut of beef that has decent fat marbling since the meat gets cooked well-done. However, because the meat is sliced so paper thin and also has a marinade, you don't have to worry about getting big, tough, and chewy pieces.
You can make it much easier on yourself by buying beef that is specifically pre-cut for bulgogi at a Korean or Asian grocery. You can also ask a butcher to cut ribeye or sirloin steaks into ⅛-inch thick slices.
If you buy steaks to slice yourself, freeze the steaks for about 1 hour to make them easier to slice.
Additional Ingredients Notes and Resources
Tamari or soy sauce. Tamari is Japanese soy sauce. Regular soy sauce contains wheat, but tamari has little or no wheat. Therefore, tamari can be gluten-free, though not always. If you eat gluten-free, make sure to read labels. I use this organic gluten-free tamari. This brand is also great, though might be a little harder to find in-store.
Maple Syrup. I use this organic maple syrup. If you like the deep dark color in a braised chicken dish, use a dark amber grade A maple syrup. You can use honey as a substitute.
Beef broth. I will always recommend that you make your own bone broth, but like the Barefoot Contessa says, store-bought is fine. Read the ingredients list and find one with chicken as the first ingredient, and without added sugar.
Sesame oil. Use toasted, not regular, sesame oil. Toasted sesame oil is dark brown and is used as a finishing oil, not as a cooking oil. This is the Japanese brand that everyone and their mothers' have been using for years. You can usually find organic like this one in natural and higher end grocery stores.
Sesame seeds. Use toasted sesame seeds.
Avocado Oil. Avocado oil is a neutral flavored oil with a high smoked point that's generally a little less processed than other refined oils like conventional seed oils. This is the brand I use. You can use any neutral oil with a high smoked point.
Can You Prep Bulgogi in Advance?
Yes! Since bulgogi needs to marinate, you absolutely should prepare it in advance! Marinated bulgogi can be prepared and stored in the marinade in a sealed container in the refrigerator for up to 3 days, or in the freezer for 2 months.
How to Store Leftover Cooked Bulgogi
Refrigerator. You can keep cooked Bulgogi in the refrigerator for 2 days.
Freezer. You can freeze cooked Bulgogi for about 3 months. The way that works best for how I maintain my freezer is portioning the Bulgogi directly into freezer-safe quart-sized bags, squeezing out all the air, sealing, and laying flat in the freezer until it freezes. Then I stand the bag or multiple bags up and line them up like thin books on a bookshelf. If you're looking to reduce single-use plastic, these are re-usable ziptop bags.
Best Korean Meat Main Dishes
What to Serve with Bulgogi
Korean people serve bulgogi with steamed white rice and an array of banchan, all the marinated, fermented, and otherwise fabulously flavorful small side dishes like kimchi , as a meal. However, I also know of people who have stuffed bulgogi between the halves of a French roll like a cheesesteak in a deliciously obscene fusion of East and West
Pile pieces of Bulgogi over a bowl of rice that will soak up the juices, and serve with any of these alongside:
- Oi Muchim, Korean Spicy Cucumbers
- Spicy Cucumber Salad with Avocado
- Din Tai Fung Dupe Cucumbers
- Korean Sesame Spinach
To Make Bulgogi an Occasion
Just like the big Korean BBQ at restaurants, you can turn Bulgogi into a Ssam Party by doubling the recipe, then adding banchan, leafy lettuces and Ssam Jang for wrapping, and some other noodle-y, stew-y side dish to the table! Here are some menu starters:
The Best Banchan:
- Homemade Kimchi
- Korean Spicy Cucumber, Oi Muchim
- Korean Carrot Salad
- Korean Pickled Radish, Chicken Mu
Favorite Korean Side Dishes:
Korean Bulgogi, Easy Recipe
Ingredients
- 2 pounds ribeye or sirloin steak, sliced across the grain into ⅛-inch wide slices or pre-sliced from the Asian grocery store
- ½ onion, cut lengthwise into ½-inch wide slices
Bulgogi Marinade Ingredients
- ⅓ cup soy sauce
- 3 tablespoons maple syrup or brown sugar
- 2-3 tablespoons unsalted beef broth or water
- 1 tablespoon sesame oil
- 1 stalk green onion, finely chopped
- 6-8 cloves garlic, grated
- 1 teaspoon fresh ginger, grated from 1-inch piece
Instructions
Prep bulgogi beef
- Have the butcher make paper-thin cross-cut slices of ribeye; or partially freeze it and slice it yourself; or go to a Korean grocery store, where they sell "bulgogi meat" already sliced.
Make Bulgogi Marinade and Marinate Beef
- In a small bowl, combine soy sauce, bone broth or water, maple syrup, garlic, ginger, green onion (including white parts), and sesame oil.
- Pour the seasoning marinade over sliced meat and sliced onions. Give the beef and onions a gentle stir to make sure all of the beef is coated with the marinade. Let the beef and onions marinate for at least 1 hour. Overnight in the refrigerator is even better.
Cook Bulgogi
- Grill marinated bulgogi over medium high flame until brown on both sides, or in single layer in a cast iron skillet until browned and beginning to caramelize. The onions will char and wilt and caramelize into fucking fantastic-ness.
Notes
Nutrition
Food for Afterthoughts
They say that the way to man’s heart is through his stomach.
Ha.
They, whoever “they” are, have clearly never taken an anatomy class because there is no connection between the stomach and heart whatsoever. None. I should know. I set the curve in IB 131 – General Human Anatomy (that’s “IB” for “Integrative Biology” and not just plain Biology because that’s how correct Berkeley Liberace-als roll). In fact, I didn’t set the curve, kittenz, I smashed it. I stomped the little lovebump of the bell curve all the way down to the y-axis so that the only pure perfection on the distribution was bio-brilliant little moi. I may have been rejected from every medical school to which I applied, but I know that the stomach is not connected to the heart. They are wrong. They probably went to that "Junior" college in Palo Alto.
Hm. *blink blink*
Did I miss something here?
Yes. Yes, I did. Stanfurd gets my panties in a bunch like you wouldn’t believe they rejected me three times for three different degrees.
Fire and Diamonds
The point is that food is to men what jewelry is to women. However, just like it's not just any sparkling cz on a stainless steel wire; it's not just any bowl of Cheerios with a splash of non-fat soy milk. I am not sure why, but there are two things, especially when they are combined, that get men whipped into a hotter frenzy than a sale on purple dinosaurs in the Barker Hangar does for women.
Fire.
Meat.
Okay, so fire and meat could get women pretty hot, too, but this is not that kind of blog (yet) (er, usually) (ok fine, today).
Fire and meat together are a screeching sirens's love song that rips through every man's flat-front khakis and periwinkle pique polo, beckons the caveman that's been domesticated under thousands of years of Schick Quattro and quiche, and releases the inner primordial pyromaniac. Must hunt meat. Must set on fire. Must eat meat. Never before was the powerful effect of fire and meat over men more neanderthalically obvious than at a Dude Party. Watching football. Drinking beer. Shooting (tequila). Circling around the grill outside in their loincloths made of cheetah pelts during the commercials. I don't think there was a vegetable within a reasonable punting distance of the place. Except, of course, potato chips. Potatoes are vegetables.
Bulgogi is a Korean girl's siren's song; bulgogi is beef; bulgogi is grilled over a flame.
Bulgogi literally translates to "fire meat."
I made bulgogi.
But he didn't ask me to marry him.
"They" were wrong.
** post originally published on 12.11.2006, recipe updated 2025 **
S.Lee says
You should let us know some hipness place to have a nice Bulgogi.
Malik says
wow delicious for me
Thank
Regards
Poh
Neil says
Maybe as a woman, you don't understand male anatomy, such as the stomach-heart thing.
JF says
my heart is made of bulgogi...and kalbi.
Happy New Year Sarah! Hope all is well in the land of delicious.
Cuong says
I am sure that you are the anatomy queen because of the class you took at Berkeley (having come from UC Irvine, I will readily admit that my physiology class was not at the same level). However, do understand how our digestive system works -
we eat food
nutrients get separated out in the stomach
good nutrients then flow into the bloodstream
the blood goes to the heart
And thus, the way into my heart IS through my stomach.
:)
Happy New Year Sarah! I am new to chowhounding and stumbled on your site. Great work, and looking forward to hearing more about delicious eats in the OC.
kingkong5
Anonymous says
You might have smashed the curve in your Integrative Biology Class in Human Anatomy but I bet you were pitchforked by it in your math classes.
If a bell curve was laid out on an X-Y coordinate, if you smashed the curve down to the Y-Axis you would have a straight line going north and south along the Y-Axis.
That's because a standard bell curve would lie on it's long side along the X-Axis which is the horizontal axis.
I think that's what you were trying to refer to. I also take it you didn't take statistics, because I have no idea what you mean by smashing a bell curve. (I take it flat)
Because if you're the best student in the class, I take it, you would be the outlier on the right side of the curve, opposite to the worst student who is an outlier on the left side of the curve. The hump in the middle is supposed to represent the average.
I just wanted to refute what you said because you said in your about me section that your favorite part of your body is your brain, your big brain in fact.
By the way, you remind me of these Asian sensation raucous twats that seem to be so prevalent these days, especially on the internet.
You know the ones that are a walking billboard for the Meredith Brooks song "i'm a bitch, I'm a lover, blah blah" and take pride in the fact that they are biatches.
Did you have a confusing, emotionally stunted, or otherwise frustrating relationship with your Korean patriarch stern father, and therefore declared to live out the rest of your life in the opposite manner in a form of subconscious protest?
Do you date only white males and will cross the street to get to the other side if another Asian male is seen walking down the street in your direction three blocks away on the same side of the street?
Just curious...
Sanjay Kumar aka Graham Wellington aka Juan Hernandez aka Tyrone Washington aka Hung Lo
sarah j. gim says
sanjay kumar...
is it only competence in mathematics that makes one intelligent? hope not, since i have never performed well in any class or task, on any test, that required math (which i did very well to make clear to you it seems?) and in fact, did fail statistics TWICE and decided not to even try to pass a third time.
as for the rest of your comments/questions, the replies to all of them are exactly right here - this blog.
incidentally, why so aggressive? why so bitter? a smart asian girl break your heart? maybe you should start a blog, too :)
Troy says
You say putting bulgogi between a French roll is a fusion of East and West... Couldn't this be taken as a Korean version of a Bahn mi?
I'm not sure I could think of Bahn mi as a "fusion dish" really... Then again, I'm just a white boy from Alabama...
Either way, this sounds delicious and I'm going to make it myself before the weekend is over. (I may even stick it between a French roll.)
sarah j. gim says
troy: Korean banh mi! yes! although when i was Cal, there was a cafe called Espresso Experience (on Bacnroft, for anyone who cares) that just called it a "Bulgogi Sandwich." the cafe is still there, still serving it (verified as of my last trip to the bay area, november 2008)
and if you do make it, please come back and let us all know how it turned out :)
Amy says
What do you have against Stanford, Sarah?? I was a little shocked by the bitterness (and lack of humility) in your words.
Amy says
What do you have against Stanford, Sarah?? I was a little shocked by the bitterness (and lack of humility) in your words.
sarah j. gim says
o, i'm just bitter. stanford rejected me three times :D
Anna says
I have to say that I absolutely love your blog!! I'm currently a student at UCLA, so it's a lot of fun to read your blog and be like, "HEY! I just went to Tahoe last night!" So thanks for repping the area, and I'm looking forward to more!
Anonymous says
Oh Sarah,
Never apologize for Stanford-hate, the place just ain't right.
Give me a Top Dog, a slice of Blondies and some pepto bismol
anyday...Plus the Cal girls are whole
'nother matter...
I recently had some home-made Bulgogi which had been marinated with some Dr. Pepper along with
the more classic ingredients.
Gotta admit that little filly had it down to a science. sweet!
thanks Sarah!
Maure
Anonymous says
Personally, I love the beef to bits. Your recipe (which looks delicious) is something I must try.
Jean says
Jeez, some of these comments creep me out a little. I think Sanjay Kumar needs a hug, or a nap, or maybe some yummy food to soothe all that belligerent aggression.
u says
If a girl made me bulgogi, I'd marry her for sure. Le sigh, as Pepe used to say.
condiment says
In Seoul, the McDonaldses serve Bulgogi Burgers.
Kevin says
That Bulgogi looks tasty!
Troy says
OK, I know it's been a few weeks, but I (and my best friend, who happens to be a culinary student) made bulgogi for our Super Bowl party.
He was in charge of the overnight marinating, I was in charge of the "meat in a wok" part. As it turns out, his mother (a Polish, Chicago-born Alabama transplant) had an ancient recipe which closely followed yours. The only difference being we used bottom round instead of rib-eye (he's a poor college kid, after all), but since he knew to slice the meat against the grain, it was melt-in-your-mouth tender anyway.
We served it three ways: simply by itself; on sandwiches (with cilantro, carrot, and jalapeno "banh mi" style); and he even deep fried some stuffed in won-ton wrappers to make what he called "Yakimandu".
It was delicious, and the second most popular Super Bowl party dish (the first being fresh guacamole with crumbled bacon, mmm bacon).
I've already added this to my "create regularly" recipe folder and I can't wait to make it again soon.
sarah j. gim says
troy: i love that you made bulgogi sandwiches but next time, make it less banh mi-ish and more korean-american bulgogi sandwich-ish! no cilantro, but add maybe some chopped red leaf lettuce and kimchi "lite?" (kimchi that is not as fermented, and with far less of the red pepper?)
of course, the yakimandu sounds the best - wrapped up in wontons skins and deep fried? amen, honey.
tom says
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