A Korean American kitchen needs ten things on the shelf and in the fridge to actually cook Korean food at home. Without them, you are improvising. With them, you can put a full Korean dinner on the table in 45 minutes on a weekday.
Youngsook has been running a Korean home kitchen in the Bay Area for over thirty years. The pantry has not changed much in that time. The basics are the basics.
This is the working list. Buy these ten, restock as you use them, and your kitchen is in business.
1. Gochujang (고추장)
The fermented red chili paste that anchors Korean cooking. Sweet, salty, spicy, deep. You will use it in bibimbap, tteokbokki, marinades, dipping sauces, stews, and as a one teaspoon shortcut to make almost any soup taste Korean.
Buy a small tub (500g) of Chung Jung One or Sempio. Bigger tubs are cheaper per ounce but the paste loses flavor after about six months open. Buy small, use it up, repeat.
Storage: refrigerate after opening. The paste will keep for a year refrigerated, but the flavor is best in the first six months.
2. Doenjang (된장)
The fermented soybean paste, the older sibling to gochujang. The base of the doenjang jjigae stew, the marinade for many vegetables, and the depth of flavor in dipping sauces.
Buy a small tub of Chung Jung One or, if you can find it, a homemade jar from a Korean market or a Korean American friend's mother. The homemade is dramatically better than the commercial.
Storage: refrigerate after opening. Lasts a year.
3. Gochugaru (고추가루)
Korean chili pepper flakes. Two cuts. Coarse for kimchi and stew. Fine for paste and color. Buy the coarse. Most diaspora cooking calls for the coarse cut.
Buy a 1 lb bag of the bright red coarse cut from a Korean grocery. The label should say "Korean" or "Taeyangcho." Avoid generic chili flakes. The Mexican or Italian versions are not the same fruit and will not work for kimchi or soondubu.
Storage: airtight in a cool dark place, ideally refrigerated. Replace if the color browns or the heat fades.
For the soondubu recipe that uses this gochugaru, see Youngsook's soondubu recipe.
4. Soy sauces, two kinds
Korean cooking uses two soy sauces, not one.
Regular Korean soy sauce (jin ganjang). Darker, sweeter, the everyday soy. Used in marinades, sauces, and any dish where the soy flavor is a top note.
Soup soy sauce (guk ganjang). Lighter color, saltier, more amber. Used in soups, stews, and seasoned vegetables (namul). Different from Japanese light soy sauce.
Buy Sempio or Sin Dong Bang for both. Keep both in the fridge after opening.
The mistake is using regular soy sauce in soups. The soup will taste wrong (too sweet, too thin). Soup soy sauce is the difference between a Korean soup that lands and one that does not.
5. Sesame oil and sesame seeds
Toasted sesame oil (chamgireum) is the finishing oil of Korean cooking. A few drops on namul, on rice, on soondubu, on bibimbap. It is not a cooking oil for high heat; it is a flavor oil added at the end.
Buy Ottogi or Kadoya in a small bottle. The smell tells you whether it is good. A nutty, deep, almost roasted smell. A flat or stale smell means the bottle is too old.
Toasted sesame seeds (kkae) are the other sesame essential. Sprinkled on namul, salads, and most banchan. Buy whole white sesame seeds and toast a small batch in a dry pan every few weeks for fresh flavor.
Storage: oil in a cool dark place, refrigerate after opening if you cook with it less than weekly. Seeds airtight at room temperature for a few weeks, refrigerate for longer.
6. Garlic, ginger, scallions, and Korean radish
The fresh aromatics. Always in the fridge.
Garlic by the head, not the jar. Most Korean recipes call for fresh minced garlic, sometimes a lot of it. A whole head a week is the diaspora baseline.
Ginger by the root. A two inch piece always in the fridge.
Scallions by the bundle. Almost every Korean dish uses sliced scallion as garnish or aromatic. A bundle a week is normal.
Korean radish (mu) is the most overlooked aromatic in diaspora kitchens. The white root vegetable used in kimchi, in soups, in pickled banchan. A 1 lb piece in the crisper opens up dozens of recipes. Substitute daikon if Korean radish is not available, but Korean radish is shorter, denser, and slightly sweeter.
7. Kimchi
Always in the fridge. A real Korean home kitchen has kimchi at every meal. The question is which kind.
Baechu kimchi (napa cabbage). The classic. Buy a 2 lb jar of Jongga, Chongga, or a Bay Area maker like Volcano Kimchi or Mr. Kim Kimchi. The Korean grocery has fresher options than the supermarket.
Kkakdugi (cubed radish kimchi). The second pillar. Crunchy, spicy, perfect with rice and stew.
Mul kimchi or dongchimi (water kimchi). The third option, milder, refreshing. Good in summer.
Keep at least baechu and one other type. Two jars in the fridge at all times.
For the broader context on what kimchi does at the dinner table, see our soondubu recipe, where the kimchi is half the dish.
8. Rice and the rice cooker
A Korean kitchen has short grain rice (japonica) and a rice cooker that works. Not jasmine. Not basmati. Short grain.
Buy a 10 lb bag of CJ or Nishiki or Kokuho Rose. Store in the original bag or transfer to an airtight container.
A Cuckoo or Zojirushi rice cooker is the standard. The IH (induction heating) models cook rice noticeably better than the basic ones. Worth the investment.
Mixed grain rice (japgokbap) is the everyday version in Korean homes. Mix the short grain rice with millet, brown rice, black rice, sweet rice, and beans. Buy the premixed bags at Korean grocery stores for the easiest entry.
9. Dried anchovies and dasima
The base of Korean soup stock.
Dried anchovies (myeolchi) for stock. Buy a bag of medium sized stock anchovies (gukmul yong myeolchi) at the Korean grocery. Keep in the freezer. The freezer extends life dramatically.
Dasima (or dashima) is dried kelp. The other half of Korean stock. Buy a bag of the rectangular sheets. Store at room temperature in an airtight container.
The basic stock: six cups water, eight to ten dried anchovies, a piece of dasima the size of a credit card. Simmer 10 minutes. Strain. The base of soondubu, doenjang jjigae, kimchi jjigae, and almost any Korean soup.
Optional add: dasida (Korean soup base powder) as a quick depth booster. CJ's brown bag is the standard. Use sparingly, one teaspoon per stew, not a substitute for real stock.
10. Roasted seaweed (gim) and dried banchan items
The pantry banchan that does not require cooking.
Roasted seaweed (gim or kim) in small toasted snack packs. The kids' lunchbox staple, and a banchan at any meal. Buy a box of 20 packs.
Dried small anchovies (myeolchi) for myeolchi bokkeum, the stir fried banchan. Different from the stock anchovies (smaller, thinner). Pan fry with sugar, soy, and gochugaru for a banchan that keeps two weeks in the fridge.
Dried laver, dried mushrooms (shiitake), dried fernbrake (gosari), and dried doraji (Korean bellflower root) are all pantry items that turn into banchan with rehydration. Build the pantry slowly with these. They keep almost forever.
For the broader banchan technique, see Youngsook's banchan deep dive (forthcoming) and the seasonal recipe rotation that follows the weekly meals.
What I would skip in the first year
Some items appear on Korean pantry lists but are not essential year one.
Cheong (Korean syrup, plum or quince). Useful but specific.
Misugaru (multigrain powder). Useful for a specific drink but not a daily cooking item.
Saewujeot (salted shrimp). Essential for making kimchi from scratch but optional if you buy kimchi rather than ferment.
Perilla leaves (kkaennip). Lovely but seasonal and not always available.
Korean rice cake (tteok). Buy fresh when needed, not as pantry stock.
These are all worth getting eventually. Year one, focus on the ten essentials above.
Where to shop in the Bay Area
The three Korean grocery options in the Bay Area for 2026.
Hankook Supermarket (Sunnyvale). Largest selection. Best for hard to find items.
H Mart (Daly City, Cupertino, and Pleasanton locations). Larger chain, broader Asian selection including Korean staples. The default for most Bay Area Korean American shoppers.
Galleria Market (Oakland). Smaller, but solid prices and a good banchan counter.
Online options include Weee! (the Asian grocery delivery service) for non perishables and SayWeee or Yamibuy for specialty items. The fresh aromatics and the kimchi are still better in person.
External notes
For more on the Korean cooking pantry from a recipe site, Maangchi's pantry list is the most accessible English language resource. For the broader food culture context, the Korea Tourism Organization's food page covers seasonal foods and regional variations.
A note from Youngsook
The pantry is what makes Korean cooking possible at home. Without these ten things, every Korean dinner is a trip to the store. With them, the dinner is in the kitchen already.
If you are building a Korean American kitchen for the first time, start with these ten. Add slowly. After a year you will have the full pantry without realizing.
For more on weekly Korean home cooked meals, see our weekly meals offering or send a note if you want a one on one kitchen consultation in San Mateo.