Education for various residents including children, vulnerable groups, and childcare institutions
Promoting healthy eating habits through hands-on food education making Doenjang and Ganjang
Geumcheon-gu (Mayor Yu Seong-hoon) announced that it has concluded the traditional dietary education course on jang (fermented paste) making, which was operated for one year, and will continue to run it next year as well.
The Geumcheon-gu Public Health Center has been running the jang making program for residents since early this year. This initiative was promoted to emphasize the importance of healthy eating habits in modern society, where chronic diseases related to diet such as diabetes and hypertension are increasing and eating out frequently, and to highlight the excellence of our traditional food, jang.
The district prepared programs such as ‘Geumcheon Uri Jangdokdae’ for local residents, ‘Geumcheon Children and Family Jangdokdae’ for children and families, and ‘Geumcheon Children Jangdokdae Experience Center’ for daycare and kindergarten children, allowing people of all ages to make jang themselves.
Participants completed the process of making doenjang (fermented soybean paste) and soy sauce, which consisted of jang making (February), jang dividing (April), and jang sharing (October) at the Sky Garden on the 6th floor of Geumcheon-gu Office.
For residents who found it difficult to participate over a long period from February to October, a one-day course called ‘Ttukbaegi Boda Jangmat’ (Better Taste Than Earthen Pot) was also operated. Participants learned about the history of Korea’s jang culture, compared commercially available gochujang (red chili paste) with homemade gochujang, and made their own jocheong gochujang (malt syrup gochujang).
In the ‘Maeumdam Jang’ program, care institutions and volunteer groups for vulnerable groups in the region gathered to make jang and shared it with the vulnerable, experiencing the unique sharing culture of our food culture.
Especially this year, for the first time, a dietary education course called ‘Jang Making Nutrition Leader’ was operated for childcare center directors. This was planned to help childcare center directors understand the importance of proper eating habits and how to make jang, so they can better guide children, who are at a critical stage of forming eating habits, about the nutritional excellence of traditional jang and healthy eating habits.
The childcare center directors who completed this education will independently operate dietary education for children and parents at their respective institutions starting next year. The Public Health Center will provide jang jars, meju (fermented soybean blocks), and jang making materials as well as tailored teaching materials for each target group to the institutions that completed the education, and will support them through regular inspections.
Yu Seong-hoon, Mayor of Geumcheon-gu, said, “I sincerely thank the residents who participated in the jang making education for one year and completed their own jang, and ask them to play a leading role in widely promoting jang, our food, so that Geumcheon-gu can become a healthy district.” He added, “In 2025, we will do our best to provide customized education for each target group by expanding the ‘Geumcheon Jangdokdae’ project.”
According to the Cultural Heritage Administration on the 4th, ‘Korea’s Jang Making Culture’ was registered as the 23rd UNESCO Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity. Since 2019, Geumcheon-gu has been conducting jang making education through the ‘Geumcheon Jangdokdae’ project, striving to promote the excellence of jang as a traditional food and to raise awareness about proper food consumption.
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