Jeonju City announced that the 2021 Jeonju Kimchi Culture Festival, an event organized by Jeonju Food Integrated Support Center, is held online and across the city area including Jeonju Stadium from November 2 to 30.
Held for the third time this year, Jeonju Kimchi Culture Festival is staged in different locations at different times considering the COVID-19 situation. While last year’s festival provided the Kimchi making (Kimjang) experience program only as a Drive-Thru event, it is held as both a Drive-Thru and an onsite event this year.
The festival offers 12 programs including Kimchi making, Kimchi sharing, Kimchi culture tour, and other specialized programs.
The Kimjang experience, the main program, is held as a Drive-Thru event on November 19 with 450 family-unit participants. On the 20th and 21st, 150 families, in groups of 25 families per session, experience Kimchi making at Jeonju Stadium. In addition, Kimjang experience for multicultural families and overseas students is provided at Jeonju Kimchi Cultural Center and each university.
On the 19th and 20th, the Kimchi sharing event is held. Organizations and groups in Jeonju donate Kimchi to the neglected class. The program also includes a 'Kimchi Sharing with Story' event where participants can send Kimchi to the people who they want to express gratitude to or the neighbors in need.
The two-day Kimchi culture tour consists of 'Kimjang Experience for Tourists' program, which helps tourists enjoy Kimchi making experience at the same time as cultural tourism, as well as “'Delicious Kimchi School' and a program to make 1kg of special Kimchi through which the participants can try making a range of Kimchi using local farm produce of Jeonju.
A variety of other interesting programs are also available including Kimchi Contest targeting 20 families, grain threshing experience, and photo zones.
Cabbage used during the festival period is supplied by farmhouses across Jeonju and salted at the HACCP-certified facilities. As for the seasoning ingredients, such as red pepper and radish, only those that passed the safety test for agricultural products are used. After the festival, the remaining cabbage and seasoning ingredients will be sold at the Kimchi Street Farmers’ Market, which will open from November 25 to 27 in Jeonju Food store.
A Jeonju Agricultural Technology Center official said, “Amid the COVID-19 pandemic, the excellence of Kimchi on human health has been verified across the world. As much as so, we prepared this festival to help participants experience and learn about Korea’s traditional culture of Kimchi making, which has been registered as the UNESCO Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity.”
