Everyone has their own childhood food cravings. It is the food they grow up with and it reminds you the memories of the past as you eat them. I grow up eating lots…, I mean lots of this dish. This is one of my favorite snacks when I was a teenager (I have lots of other favorites, too). This dish is called Ddukppoki (떡볶이), the spicy Korean rice cakes.
As a teenage girl in middle/high school(I attended girls only school, no boys there except teachers), I had to wear school uniforms, white blouse with black overall skirt and navy canvas shoes. The skirt should cover your knees completely. No girls liked wearing uniforms. There was no unique individual style whatsoever. Every girl looked exactly the same, only different in sizes.
Our school had very strict rules over its dress code. Not only the dress, the hair style too. Every one had a exact same hair style. A simple black hair pin on one side of your head to hold the hair and the straight hair line that should sit just below your ears. No more than 1″ below the ears! No bangs, No make up, and No perms are allowed. If you violate any of this, you will get kicked out of school, period! There are lots of fun stories that associated with this dress/hair code, but I will share the stories some other time.
Things change! Korean school girls these days still wear uniforms but they get to have free hair styles and some even wears make up. I don’t think I ever showed my teenage photos to my piano man. I looked hideous on the photo, and every girl did look horrendous as well, whether they are very pretty or less pretty. It is the one evidence of my past that I would like to bury on the ground forever!
Anyway, somehow the subject matter(the food) went to a different direction. Let’s talk about this rice cake. This is the ultimate snack(can be a meal) for all Korean teenagers or anybody. I won’t be lying if I say 50million Koreans grow up eating this dish. As teenagers we were always hungry when school was over in the late afternoon. There was a big market square on the way to our neighborhood from the school. My friends and I often stopped by one of these rice cake vendors and stuffed our belly with this spicy goddess, the soft yet chewy rice cakes slobbered with spicy chili paste gochujang sauce!…. along with other things such as deep fried calamaris, vegetable fritters(Tuigim, 튀김), fish cakes(Odeng, 오뎅), etc… They were so tasty as I am thinking back and I crave them often these days.<
So I would like to share with you how you can recreate this dish at your own kitchen. This can be quite spicy if you are not used to the spicy Korean food. Burning sensation in your mouth! Besides serving this dish can be a good way to revenge your husband or boyfriend who forgot the important date… Let him burn!
Korean chili paste, sugar, dried sea kelp, dried anchovies, garlic, leek, cabbage.
The stock will get more intensified as you let it sit, about 15 minutes.
Remove our ocean friends from the pot.
The queen of Korean flavors! My royal highness!
If you don’t want the oil…
This is an optional step.
Dice the cabbage beautifully like I did.
Slice the leek as you’re humming like a bird.
Chop the garlic as you hit the high note on O Sole Mio!
Just kidding!
If he forgot your birthday…, then add 6Tbsp or more!
Smear the paste with spoon to mix in with the stock.
Add sugar and mix well.
Place the pan over medium heat. Add rice cakes and cabbage.
The sauce will get slightly thicken, too.
until the sauce gets really thickened for your liking.
Add the leek and mix in well.
It will bring subtle tang to the sauce and adds beautiful deep orange color.
Stir them well and it is ready to serve.
and thought about my high school friends.
Where are they now?
An important Korean vocabulary to learn!
But don’t you dare to call me Ajumma!
Ingredients
- 4 1/2C water
- 8-10 dried anchovies
- 1 piece of dried sea kelp, about 4" long
- 1 1/3 lb (600g) rice cakes, usually comes as frozen
- 4-5T Korean red chili paste (gochujang)
- 3T sugar
- 3 slices flat fish cakes cut into big chunks, optional
- 1/2 cabbage diced
- 1 leek, white and light green part sliced
- 1 garlic chopped
- 1-2T ketchup, optional
- 1t sesame seeds roasted
- dash pepper
Directions
- To make stock pour water in a pot, and add anchovies and sea kelp. Boil first and then reduce the heat to low. Cover and simmer for 10 minutes. Remove from heat and let it sit for another 10-15 minutes to get the full flavor. Reserve 4 cups.
- Soak the rice cake in the water for 5 minutes. If you want to get rid of the coated oil, blanch them in the boiling water for 30 seconds.
- Pour the stock to a non stick pan and add the chili paste and sugar. Mix well. Add rice cakes and cabbage. Boil over medium heat, reduce heat to medium-low, simmer uncovered until the cabbage gets soften and the sauce gets thicken.
- Add the fish cakes, if you wish, and garlic. Continue to simmer for another 10 minutes until the sauce gets well thickened to your liking.
- Add ketchup and stir well. Sprinkle some peppers and sesame seeds. Good to serve hot right out of pan. Napkins are a must!
Thanks for visiting my blog. Hope your Ddukppoki turned out good.
Hi Laura
I would love to hear how you and your boyfriend like it. Thanks for visiting my blog.
Does the cooked rice cakes keep well overnight in fridge? If reheated will the texture change?
Thanks for your fast help! Actually I had the same frozen ones as shown in your picture. But when I soak them they crack up. I also made tteok myself (poor attempt) and froze them for later and I have the same problem with them. Maybe some kind of storage problem? Or it depends on the temperature of the water?. Do you let them defrost slowly before you soak them?
I will experiment some more tonight for dinner! :-)
sauce, it will make the dish very very salty.
If I were to make a bigger batch, say for about 8 people, I just have to double everything, right? Including the amount of anchovies for the stock? And also, can I skip the sea kelp and just have the anchovies?
You can double the recipe but reduce the amount of the stock and the chili paste a little bit first (by 1 1/2X instead of 2X). You can always add more if you need.
You don't need to add kelp. Anchovies alone can bring wonderful flavor.
Have fun making them and let me know how it turned out.
Yes, you can change to chicken stock, but use low sodium one. You might want to reduce the chili passte just a little since most store bought chicken stocks have lots of sodium in them.
Hmmm, I'm sorry to hear that it was watery. It should be somewhat saucy but not watery though. I wonder it there was too much stock/water. Reduce the amount of liquid a little and cook up the liquid over higher heat, UNCOVERED. The sauce should eventually thickens and be able to coat the rice cakes over all. Hope this helps. Please let me know how it turns out next time.
You can use chicken stock but it will bring slightly different flavor. Use low sodium chicken stock since the chili paste already has some sodium in it. Also you can use the flat rice cake slices as well. But reduce the amount of liquid into 1/2. The will get cooked faster.
Hmmm..., I have to say NO for substituting chili paste with soybean oil for Korean chili paste. They are different. If you are not near Korean market, try ordering online. Amazon carries Korean stuffs and Hmart has their online shop as well.
http://www.hmart.com/shopnow/shopnow_newsub_top.asp?t=1120
Unfortunately there is no substitute for it since it is unique to Korean cuisine.
do you have any idea where to find it here instead of making the rice cake.