Samchi-gui (Grilled Spanish Mackerel)

Samchi is a market fish first. In the colder months, when the flesh has more fat and the skin shines cleanly, it belongs on the weeknight table with rice, kimchi, and one green namul. Cook the month you're standing in. If the samchi looks tired, buy godeungeo (mackerel) or galchi (hairtail) instead and give them the same respect.

This dish lives or dies by salt and dryness. Spanish mackerel has soft flesh, kinder than many fish and nearly boneless if the fishmonger has cut it well, but that softness can turn ragged in a careless pan. Salt it by measure, let it stand, then dry it hard with a towel. The salt seasons the fish and tightens the surface so it grills clean instead of falling apart.

Notebook 42 says 10 grams of coarse sea salt for 650 grams of fish, rested 20 minutes, then wiped dry. That is not a grand formula. It is how a plain fish becomes repeatable. Serve it as Koreans do, with rice, a little soy-vinegar dipping sauce if you like, and enough quiet at the table for the fish to taste like itself.