Spicy Rice Cake Recipe – Tteokbokki (Video)

Tteokbokki is frequently paired with eomuk (fish cakes), boiled eggs, and scallions in dishes.
It can be seasoned with either a spicy gochujang (chili paste)-based sauce or a non-spicy ganjang (soy sauce)-based sauce, the former is the most common, while the latter is less common and sometimes called gungjung-tteokbokki (royal court tteokbokki).

The dish was first recorded in Siuijeonseo, a 19th century cookbook, where it was listed using the archaic spelling steokbokgi. According to the book, tteok-bokki was also known as tteokjjim (steamed rice cakes), tteok-japchae (stir-fried rice cakes), and tteok-jeongol (stir-fried rice cakes) (rice cakes hot pot).

White tteok (rice cakes), sirloin, sesame oil, soy sauce, scallions, rock tripe, pine nuts, and toasted and ground sesame seeds were used in the royal court version, while the savory, soy sauce-based tteok-bokki was made in the head house of the Papyeong Yun clan, where high-quality soy sauce was brewed.

Ingredients like short ribs were common in this version. Tteok-bokki is also described as a soy sauce-based savory dish in the revised and expanded edition of Joseon Yori Jebeop.

The spicy variant of tteok-bokki made with gochujang-based sauce is thought to have first appeared in 1953. When Ma Bok-Lim helped open a Korean-Chinese restaurant, she inadvertently dropped tteok, or rice cake, that was handed out during the event into jajangmyeon.

She came up with the idea of seasoning tteok in gochujang, a Korean chili sauce, after tasting it. She then began selling it in Sindang, which has since become the most popular variant of tteok-bokki. As a result, the Sindang district is now famous for its tteok-boki.