If you’re interested in Korean food but never had tteokbokki, well what are you waiting for?!
It’s been a street food favourite for decades, with it being mostly enjoyed as a snack by one of those carts that also serve eomuk guk (fish cake soup) and various tygim (tempura everything).
How to describe it? If you ever had rice cake or mochi, you’ll be familiar with the chewy texture and this is no different.
It has a satisfying mouthfeel. If you never had mochi, well it’s kinda like gnocchi??? But much chewier and less stodgy.
It’s cooked in a gochujang sauce, along with Korean stock, sugar, soy sauce and plenty of finely ground gochugaru. It also usually has fishcake in it and sometimes even boiled eggs (I never serve mine with boiled eggs btw).
It’s a mix of sweet and spicy, perfectly enjoyed with some fried food dipped into it, such as fried mandu (dumplings).
Couldn’t be easier to make!
Recipe for 2
250g rice cake (cylinder shape)
4 TBS gochujang
800ml Korean stock (or veggie stock)
2 sheets of fish cake sliced into strips
1 TBS golden syrup or sugar
1 TBS soy sauce
2 TBS finely ground gochugaru (or more if you want it 🔥
2 cloves of garlic minced.
Mix all the ingredients together apart from the rice cake and fishcake.
Bring to boil, add rice and fish cake, stir slowly over medium heat until the rice cake is soft. The sauce should be thickened. This should take about 15 mins.
You can add more stock and make it soupy, add plain ramen noodles to make rabokki (ramen tteokbokki)
Serve with fried dumplings!
