Tteok-bokki (Spicy Rice Cakes — Street Food Style)
Tteok-bokki — chewy cylindrical rice cakes (garae-tteok) cooked in a sweet-spicy gochujang sauce — is Korea's most beloved street food, sold at pojangmacha (street carts) across the country and eaten at all hours as a snack, a meal, or late-night comfort food. The preparation requires almost no cooking skill, but the quality of the tteok (rice cake) and the balance of the sauce are everything. The sauce — gochujang, gochugaru, soy sauce, sugar, and anchovy stock — should be simultaneously sweet, spicy, and slightly sticky, coating each rice cake in a glossy red glaze. The rice cakes must be fresh or properly rehydrated (frozen or refrigerated tteok must be soaked in warm water until soft before cooking). The result is a preparation of remarkable textural pleasure: the chewy, yielding rice cakes in their sticky, sweet-spicy sauce is one of the most distinctive textures in East Asian street food.
Nine in town · four not yet within reach.
- In town
- 9 · korean rice cakes (tteok), gochugaru (Korean red chili flakes), gochujang (Korean red chili paste), caster sugar, garlic cloves, fresh ginger, hard-boiled eggs, sesame oil, sea salt
- Not yet within reach
- 4 · gochujang-based sauce (or prepared Korean rice cake sauce), water or dashi stock, korean fish cake (eomuk), sesame seeds
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