By Eric Kim

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Kimjang, the act of preparing kimchi, allows Koreans of the diaspora to keep the tradition alive — and invites everyone to join.

Kimchi is like a zombie, said Ji Hye Kim, the chef at Miss Kim in Ann Arbor, Mich. “Not quite alive, but not quite dead.”

In kimchi making, salt stalls the decomposition of fresh vegetables and allows good lactic-acid bacteria to grow through fermentation. Ms. Kim, 44, recalls a time in her life, back in Seoul, when she had to keep watch for the building superintendent as her mother buried a crock of kimchi in the flower garden of their apartment complex. Months later, they would dig it up and enjoy the kimchi in its aged state, with its pleasurable tang and abundance of umami.

With a pickled briny flavor and gamchil mat (“savory taste” in Korean), kimchi is the national dish of South Korea and traditionally prepared at a kimjang, the communal act of making and sharing kimchi. Over the course of multiple days each November, neighbors and family members gather to preserve pounds and pounds of butter-yellow napa cabbage by salting them and then mixing and packing them with sauce.

For many communities in South Korea, a kimjang (also spelled gimjang) remains a grand act. But these days, Korean cooks outside of the motherland are adapting to their individual environments accordingly, scaling down their kimjangs to fit their lives or even hosting them virtually.

In a world where most people buy their kimchi at the store, preserving the act of preservation has become a priority for Koreans who wish to carry on the tradition of kimjang.