Buchu-jeon (Garlic Chive Pancake)

Buchu arrives at the market in tied bundles, dark green and flat-bladed, and the best ones bend without looking tired. Late spring and summer are its honest months. Cook the month you're standing in: if the buchu is yellowed, dry at the tips, or smells dull, buy good scallions and make pa-jeon instead.

This pancake lives or dies by proportion. Notebook 31 says 200 grams of garlic chives to 125 grams of flour and starch, and that is already more batter than Master Seong-nyeo liked. The batter is there to bind the green, not bury it. Stir it hard for chew, then spread it thin enough that the chives lie in one rough layer. Thick batter gives you a soft cake. Thin batter gives you buchu-jeon.

At home it goes down in triangles or rough squares before dinner is finished cooking, with cho-ganjang (soy-vinegar dipping sauce) close enough for every hand. I won't tell you the flip is graceful. Use a wide spatula, or a plate if your courage is small that day. The standard is not elegance in the air; it is a crisp edge, a tender middle, and chives that still taste like chives.