Omoni’s (Mom’s) Kim Chee

Our latest Invitation to Design workshop wasn’t about just home design and décor. The substory of Cathy Lee’s mom’s kim chee, woven into Cathy’s introductory anecdotes about growing up design-challenged in Pearl City, took on a life of its own.

According to Cathy, money was always scarce when she and her two brothers were kids. To keep them in private schools, her Korean-born mom, Betty, supplemented Cathy’s police officer dad’s income by babysitting. Then the homemade kim chee she was bringing to her sons’ Pop Warner pot lucks every week took off. Moms wanted it as a dinner condiment; dads wanted it for pau hana pupus.

Requests began flooding in, and soon Betty was making kim chee by the gallon. She’d buy loads of won bok cabbage, turnip or cucumber and spend all day at the task, which brought in $10 for a gallon and $5 for a half-gallon—amounts that helped her family back in the ’70s and ’80s.

By the end of the workshop, people were seeking Betty out. Some just wanted to meet her and say hello, others told her how their mouths watered as Cathy was telling her story, and still others asked for Betty’s recipe.

See the recipe »