Substitutions that hold up: cuts, sweeteners, soy
We've built the marinade, cooked the meat, timed the whole sequence. Now for the interesting question: what do you do when you open the fridge and something's missing?
Because it will happen. You'll be halfway into dinner and realize the brown sugar's gone, or the only beef at the store is a cut you don't recognize, or your soy sauce situation is strange. Totally normal. Home cooking is a logistics puzzle, and substitutions are half the fun of solving it. I won't pretend every swap matches the original — some don't — but plenty are perfectly fine, and I'll tell you straight which is which and why.
Cuts of beef
Traditional bulgogi is ribeye, thin sliced — exactly what you'll find pre-sliced at the Korean grocery up in Salt Lake. If you can get it, absolutely use it.
But you won't always have it on hand, or the budget for it, so here's what genuinely holds up:
- Sirloin — my go-to backup. Less fat than ribeye, but slice it thin and against the grain and it stays tender, and the marinade penetrates it just fine.
- Flank steak — leaner, a bit more chew, but the marinade earns its keep here. Slice thin, no exceptions — the grain runs long and pronounced on flank, so if you don't cut against it you'll be chewing forever.
- Chuck roast, sliced thin — this one surprises people. It's a tougher cut, but it's marbled with enough fat that the marinade plus quick, high-heat cooking tenderizes it well. Ask the meat counter to slice it if your knife skills aren't there yet. Most will do it for free if you ask nicely.
What doesn't work: anything pre-cut for stew or hacked into thick chunks. Bulgogi is a quick-cook method by design. Thick pieces never catch up in the short time they get in the pan — you end up with the outside tough and the center pink and cold. If a roast is all you've got, slice it yourself, thin, partially frozen to steady it under the knife. Twenty minutes in the freezer firms the meat just enough to make thin slicing far easier — same principle as before, cold muscle holds its shape.
Sweeteners
Traditional recipes lean on sugar, sometimes with pear or apple worked into the marinade for extra sweetness and tenderizing. Here's the substitution order I actually reach for, best to worst:
- Brown sugar — my regular pick, and already on your pantry list.
- Honey — works, but its sugars brown faster in the pan, so mind your heat; it'll catch and burn before granulated sugar would.
- Regular white sugar — fine in a pinch, does the job, just without the same depth.
- Grated pear or apple — not really a substitute, more an addition. Got a pear going soft in the fridge? Grate a quarter of it into the marinade alongside your sugar. Old trick, and the enzymes in the fruit nudge the meat a little more tender too.
Don't drop the sweetener entirely thinking you're doing yourself a favor. It's not only about taste — it balances the soy's saltiness, and it's what lets the meat caramelize in the pan. Skip it and the bulgogi tastes flat and stays pale, never picking up that bit of char.
Soy sauce
Fair warning — soy sauce isn't one single thing. Korean soup soy sauce (guk-ganjang) is a different animal from the all-purpose soy sauce you marinate with, and the two are not interchangeable, so don't grab the wrong bottle off the shelf at the Asian market assuming soy sauce is soy sauce. For bulgogi you want regular, all-purpose soy sauce.
If a Kikkoman bottle from Macey's is all you have, that's fine. It runs saltier and a touch sharper than Korean brands, so ease off the amount slightly — maybe three-quarters of what the recipe calls for — and taste before adding more.
Low-sodium soy sauce works fine too, if that's your household staple. You may need a little extra, since you're diluting the salt, but it won't wreck the dish.
The one swap I'd steer you away from is coconut aminos or a "soy-free" alternative in place of soy sauce, at least expecting an identical result. They're thinner, sweeter, and missing that deep fermented backbone soy sauce brings. If there's an allergy in the house, though, use them without guilt — I'd rather you make bulgogi with coconut aminos than skip it entirely. Just go in knowing it'll taste different. Not worse, necessarily. Different. Don't blame the recipe.
Don't overengineer it
I realize that's a mountain of detail for what's meant to be a simple swap-this-for-that lesson. Jot down the swaps that fit your kitchen and let the rest go.
The first time I laid out a full spread the way my mom used to — rice, bulgogi, three banchan, soup, all of it on the table at once — I stepped back and felt like I'd finally cracked it. Years of writing things down, timing things, working out what actually holds up in my kitchen instead of my mom's, and there it was. Then Bronson asked if there were chicken nuggets.
That's the job. You mostly get it right, and someone still wants nuggets. Substitutions run on the same logic — you're not chasing perfect, you're chasing something that lands dinner on the table and tastes like what you were aiming for. Most of these swaps deliver.
Before next time: look at what beef is actually in your fridge or freezer right now and work out which substitution applies to you. Come next class ready to tell me the cut you're working with.