The Soup Korean Women Eat after Giving Birth

Korean women eat Seaweed soup, or Miyeok-Guk (미역국), to regain strength after carrying a child for 9 months and giving birth. Nevertheless, this soup can be eaten regularly despite the occasion.

Korean dishes are generally very nutritious and plant-based, and if mindful about which ingredients are included, healthy. Seaweed soup can be cooked many ways: with beef, short neck clam, or vegan.

While I’d love to make this soup vegan to benefit my personal health, I didn’t have the time to cook the broth the way that Mommy Tang does in her video. I figured short neck clam was the next best thing as I didn’t want to ingest the fatty oils from the beef.

Below are the ingredients, directions, and health benefits for this nutritious meal:

Ingredients

1. 1 ounce or 20g of dried seaweed
   TIP: Check labels to make sure your seaweed didn’t come from polluted waters. Seaweed absorbs — that means it can absorb the nutrients of the ocean, or the pollution. One great website that is transparent about the amount of heavy metals their seaweed is here.

2. 2 cups short-neck clam meat
   TIP: You could also find this at a Korean mart in the frozen seafood section.

3. 1/2 tbsp minced garlic or 3 cloves of garlic mashed

4. 1 tbsp of soy sauce

5. 1 tbsp of oyster sauce

6. 1 tsp of sesame oil
   TIP: The sesame oil I used was made by my aunts in Korea so I didn’t have to worry about it being processed. I tried my best to find a tasty Korean sesame oil in the link. The company is known to be non-GMO and organic without compromising taste.

7. salt to taste

Directions:

1. Soak the dried seaweed for 20-30 minutes. Seaweed expands to 7 times its size, so it’s important not to use too much seaweed. 

2. Soak the frozen short neck clam meat as well until it melts.

3. Rinse the seaweed and the short neck clam.
   TIP: It’s important to rinse the clams because the frozen water ruins the flavor of the soup. Avoid over-rinsing or else you’ll lose the flavor of the ocean that makes the soup so tasty.

4. Strain the water from both the seaweed and clams.

5. Cut seaweed into a length of around two inches.

6. Fill the pot 3/4 with water.

7. Place seaweed into the pot of water and boil on medium high heat for 20-30 minutes.

8. Add clams, 1 tbsp of soy sauce, 1 tbsp of oyster sauce, 1 tbsp of sesame oil and 1/2 tbsp of minced garlic. Stir. Let it boil for another 20 minutes.

9. Add salt to taste

10. Serve right away with rice and side dishes like kimchi.