Grilled Asian Chicken with Peanut Noodles and Cucumber Sambal

Week one hundred. I've been writing this weekly chronicle for one hundred weeks — almost two years of tracking my life through food and identity and therapy and the slow construction of a Korean-American self. The number feels significant. One hundred weeks of kimchi and jjigae and Maangchi videos and H Mart trips and metal chopsticks and Dr. Yoon and Karen's pot roast and David's stoic encouragement and Kevin's parallel construction project. One hundred data points on a trend line that points unmistakably upward: from a woman who couldn't make rice to a woman who cooks Korean food from Korean-language cookbooks. From a woman who was "fine" to a woman who is real. From Baby Girl #4719 to Stephanie Grace Park, Korean-American, adopted, reclaiming, cooking, alive.

The DNA results came back. I opened the email on Tuesday morning, sitting at my desk at Amazon, and my hands were shaking. The results: 99.7% Korean. The remaining 0.3%: unspecified East Asian. I am, genetically, about as Korean as a person can be. The number shouldn't have surprised me — I knew I was Korean, the adoption records said Korean, my face says Korean — but seeing it quantified, confirmed by science, expressed as a percentage on a screen, made it feel more real than any amount of kimchi jjigae could. 99.7%. Not ambiguous. Not mixed. Not "where are you really from?" Not "you don't look like your parents." Korean. 99.7% Korean. The science confirms what the cooking already told me.

No genetic matches for close relatives. The database is consumer-level — it catches relatives who've also taken the test, and my birth family apparently has not. The absence of matches was both disappointing and expected — the Korean adoption-specific databases are the ones more likely to produce results, and I haven't submitted to those yet. But the absence is also information: my birth family is not looking for me through 23andMe. They might be looking through other channels. Or they might not be looking at all. The not-knowing continues, but it continues with a new data point: 99.7% Korean. The most Korean thing about me, it turns out, is my DNA.

I told Dr. Yoon. She said, "How does the number feel?" I said, "Validating. And also obvious. And also — I don't know — mine. The number is mine. My Korean-ness is measurable and it's mine." She said, "The kimchi already told you that." She's right. The kimchi told me first. The DNA just confirmed the kimchi's diagnosis.

This week's cooking was celebratory: I made a feast for one. Kimchi jjigae, galbi, japchae, three banchan, rice. A full Korean table for one person, celebrating week one hundred and 99.7% and the accumulation of a hundred weeks of learning and cooking and becoming. I ate at my desk-table (I really should buy a dining table) with my metal chopsticks, and the chopsticks are comfortable in my hands now, the way forks are comfortable, the way typing is comfortable — muscle memory, earned through repetition, a skill that's mine because I worked for it.

Saturday: Bellevue. I told Karen and David about the DNA results. "99.7% Korean," I said. David said, "That's about as homogeneous as it gets." Karen said nothing for a moment, then said, "I could have told them that. One look at you and I could have told them that." She was smiling. The smile of a woman who has been looking at her Korean daughter for twenty-four years and never needed a test to know what she sees. She sees Korean. She's always seen Korean. She just didn't know how to talk about it until her Korean daughter showed her how, one dish at a time, one week at a time, one hundred weeks of cooking and talking and eating and growing.

A hundred weeks called for a full table — galbi, japchae, kimchi jjigae, banchan, rice — and I pulled it off. But if you want to carry that same spirit of celebration into your own kitchen without the multi-hour production, this is the recipe I keep coming back to: grilled chicken with a soy-sesame glaze that tastes like intention, peanut noodles that scratch the same itch as japchae, and a cucumber sambal so sharp and bright it cuts right through everything heavy. It’s the kind of meal you make with your metal chopsticks when you have a number worth toasting — even if you’re the only one at the table.

Prep Time: 20 min | Cook Time: 20 min | Total Time: 40 min | Servings: 2

Ingredients

Chicken & Marinade

2 boneless, skinless chicken thighs (about 6 oz each)
3 tablespoons soy sauce
1 tablespoon sesame oil
1 tablespoon honey
2 teaspoons rice vinegar
2 cloves garlic, minced
1 teaspoon fresh ginger, grated
1/2 teaspoon gochugaru or red pepper flakes (optional)

Peanut Noodles

6 oz thin rice noodles or soba noodles
3 tablespoons creamy peanut butter
2 tablespoons soy sauce
1 tablespoon sesame oil
1 tablespoon rice vinegar
1 tablespoon honey
1 clove garlic, minced
2–3 tablespoons warm water, to thin
2 green onions, thinly sliced
1 tablespoon toasted sesame seeds

Cucumber Sambal

1 English cucumber, thinly sliced into half-moons
1 tablespoon rice vinegar
1 teaspoon sesame oil
1 teaspoon soy sauce
1/2 teaspoon sugar
1/4 teaspoon red pepper flakes
1 clove garlic, minced
Small pinch of salt

Instructions

Marinate the chicken. Whisk together the soy sauce, sesame oil, honey, rice vinegar, garlic, ginger, and gochugaru in a shallow bowl. Add the chicken thighs and turn to coat. Marinate at room temperature for 15 minutes (or up to 4 hours refrigerated).
Make the cucumber sambal. Toss cucumber slices with rice vinegar, sesame oil, soy sauce, sugar, red pepper flakes, garlic, and salt. Stir to combine and set aside to pickle lightly while you cook — at least 10 minutes.
Cook the noodles. Cook noodles according to package directions. Drain and rinse under cold water. Set aside.
Make the peanut sauce. Whisk together peanut butter, soy sauce, sesame oil, rice vinegar, honey, and garlic. Add warm water one tablespoon at a time until the sauce is pourable but still coats a spoon.
Grill the chicken. Heat a grill pan or outdoor grill over medium-high heat. Remove chicken from marinade and grill 5–6 minutes per side, until cooked through and nicely charred at the edges. Let rest 5 minutes, then slice against the grain.
Dress the noodles. Toss the cooked noodles with the peanut sauce until evenly coated. Top with sliced green onions and sesame seeds.
Assemble and serve. Plate the peanut noodles, arrange the sliced chicken alongside, and spoon the cucumber sambal on the side. Serve with metal chopsticks if you have them — they make it feel right.

Nutrition (per serving)

Grilled Asian Chicken with Peanut Noodles and Cucumber Sambal — A Full Table, Earned