Street Food & Snacks
Tteok Kkochi (Rice Cake Skewers)
Prep
10 min
Cook
15 min
Servings
3
Photo: wjarrettc · CC BY
Steps
- 1
Soak the rice cakes in warm water 10 minutes if they are hard or refrigerated.
- 2
Pat them dry and thread 4-5 onto each skewer.
- 3
Whisk gochujang, ketchup, corn syrup, soy sauce, gochugaru and garlic into a glaze.
- 4
Heat oil in a wide pan and fry the skewers until blistered and golden on all sides, about 6-8 minutes.
- 5
Take the pan off the heat before the sauce goes anywhere near it.
- 6
Brush the glaze onto the fried skewers in a thin layer.
- 7
Return briefly to low heat, brush a second layer, and repeat once more.
- 8
Finish with sesame seeds and serve hot.
Did you know — Korean culture
Tteok kkochi is school-gate food in the most literal sense - the carts cluster outside hagwon and middle schools in the late afternoon, priced for pocket money. It is close kin to tteokbokki but sold on a stick precisely because it is meant to be eaten walking, without a bowl or a chair.
Frying first is the whole difference between tteok kkochi and tteokbokki. The rice cakes need to blister and firm up in oil so they have a chewy, slightly crisp skin. Simmered in sauce from the start they just go soft, which is a fine dish but a different one.
The glaze contains sugar and ketchup and will scorch in seconds over the heat that browned the rice cakes. Pull the pan off, brush, and return it briefly on low - building the coating in two or three thin layers gives a deep glossy finish where one thick coat gives you a burnt one.
Refrigerated rice cakes are hard and will stay hard through frying unless they are soaked first. Warm water for ten minutes brings them back; frying them straight from cold gives a crust around a stubbornly firm centre.
Troubleshooting
Rice cakes hard in the middle? Not soaked. Ten minutes in warm water before they go on the skewer.
Sauce burning? Applied over full heat. Take the pan off, brush, then return on low.
Rice cakes sliding off the skewer? Thread them while still slightly damp and push them close together.