52 Fun Facts About Korean Food

Kimchi is most often made from which salted vegetable?

Napa cabbage kimchi mattered so much that during the Vietnam War, South Korea's president asked the US to help get kimchi to his troops.

Traditionally, where was winter kimchi stored to keep it from freezing?

In earthenware jars buried in the ground, kimchi stayed unfrozen through winter; today many Korean homes use special kimchi refrigerators instead.

What is the name for Korea's communal late-autumn custom of preparing a winter's supply of salted vegetables together?

Kimjang comes in late autumn, when communities make and share big batches of kimchi so every household has enough to last the harsh winter.

Squid Game players must carve a shape out of which Korean street snack without breaking it?

Dalgona is just melted sugar puffed with baking soda, and after the show, fans flooded TikTok trying the challenge at home, mostly cracking theirs.

What does the word bibimbap literally mean?

Mixed rice is the literal meaning, and one custom had families eat bibimbap on lunar New Year's Eve to use up leftover side dishes.

Which city is most famous for its version of bibimbap?

Jeonju celebrates the dish with a yearly Bibimbap Festival, where visitors can learn to make it themselves.

What is dolsot bibimbap served in?

A very hot stone pot keeps the rice cooking at the table, so the layer touching the pot turns into a crisp, golden crust.

What does the word bulgogi literally mean?

Fire meat is the literal meaning, and the flavour has jumped into fast food: South Korean burger chains sell bulgogi burgers.

On Black Day, when South Korean singles gather to commiserate, which noodle dish do they traditionally eat?

Jajangmyeon, noodles in black bean sauce: singles who got no gifts on Valentine's Day or White Day gather wearing black to eat it.

Korean barbecue was adapted to Japanese tastes and is known in Japan by what name?

Yakiniku caught on as the name after Korea's division split Japan's Korean restaurant owners into rival North and South camps.

Galbi, a favourite of Korean barbecue, is made from which cut?

Beef short ribs are grilled, then snipped into pieces over the grill with kitchen scissors and wrapped in lettuce.

What is samgyeopsal, a staple of Korean barbecue restaurants?

Grilled pork belly is a newer favourite than you'd think: 'samgyeopsal' only entered the standard Korean dictionary after 1994.

Which Korean summer dessert piles sweetened red beans on a bed of shaved ice?

Patbingsu has an old forerunner: Joseon officials were given ice from royal stores and ate it crushed with fruit.

Ma Bok-rim, credited with inventing spicy gochujang tteokbokki, sold it in which Seoul neighbourhood?

Sindang is now home to a whole 'Tteokbokki Town' of restaurants, and her spicy red version became the most common kind.

What is the non-spicy, soy-sauce-based version of tteokbokki called?

Gungjung (royal court) style is the older dish: an 1800s cookbook records it, long before today's red, spicy version took over.

What do Koreans call online broadcasts of a host eating large amounts of food while chatting with viewers?

Mukbang blends the Korean words for eating and broadcasting, and fans send money to hosts they enjoy, so top stars earn a high income.

Chilli peppers, the heat behind gochujang, are native to which part of the world?

The Americas: European explorers carried chillies out of the New World, and they now power Korean staples from gochujang to kimchi.

What is the collective name for the small side dishes served with rice at a Korean meal?

Banchan are often vegetarian, but the kimchi among them usually isn't, since it's typically seasoned with salted seafood.

In Parasite, 'ram-don' combines two instant noodles with which pricey topping?

Beef sirloin was the rich family's upgrade to a cheap noodle mix, and after the film, fans rushed to cook 'ram-don' themselves.

Which Korean province is particularly famous for serving many different side dishes in a single meal?

Jeolla's plentiful tables draw on rice from the fertile Honam Plain and fish from the Yellow Sea off its coast.

Dangmyeon, the glass noodles of Korean cooking, are made from what?

Sweet potato starch is what gives dangmyeon their springy, elastic chew, unlike softer rice vermicelli.

Yi Chung created which dish for a 17th-century palace banquet of King Gwanghaegun?

Japchae then had no glass noodles at all: it was stir-fried vegetables, and the noodles only joined the dish in the 20th century.

Samgyetang is a soup of a whole young chicken stuffed with rice, garlic, jujube and what?

Ginseng is the star today, but the soup's roots are traced to a chicken broth with milkvetch root served to an ailing Joseon queen.

When is samgyetang traditionally eaten?

On the three sambok days, the hottest of summer, Koreans 'fight heat with heat', eating steaming soup to replace what sweating takes out.

Budae-jjigae, or army stew, is famous for containing which American canned food?

Spam came off US army bases in the war's hungry aftermath, and though meat is plentiful now, army stew without it is still unimaginable.

Which city claims to have invented budae-jjigae and has a street of specialist restaurants?

Uijeongbu sat beside US Army bases stocked with food scarce elsewhere, so the stew spread especially fast there.

What does the name soju literally mean?

Burned liquor hints at distilling, yet most cheap soju is ethanol diluted with water and sweeteners rather than a slow-distilled spirit.

Who introduced the distilling technique behind soju to Korea in the 13th century?

The Yuan Mongols had picked up distilling from the Persians during their conquests.

Which city's soju is considered the direct root of modern Korean soju?

Traditional hand-crafted Andong soju is about 45 percent alcohol.

Which soju maker's flagship brand was the world's best-selling spirit in 2013?

HiteJinro's Jinro soju is only about 20 percent alcohol, so some US restaurants can sell it with just a beer and wine licence.

What is makgeolli?

A milky, lightly sparkling rice wine, it was brewed from wheat instead for decades after rice shortages led to a ban.

What English nickname for makgeolli won a South Korean government contest?

Drunken rice was chosen by a five-member panel, as the government sought an English name to help sell makgeolli abroad.

Makgeolli is also called nongju, meaning what?

Farmer's wine, because farm households brewed it to serve the workers labouring in their fields.

What is chimaek?

Fried chicken with beer is chimaek, and chicken sales surge when South Korea's national team plays at a World Cup.

How is Korean fried chicken often cooked?

Fried, then fried again, the chicken turns extra crispy instead of going soggy.

What is yangnyeom chicken?

Fried chicken in sweet, spicy sauce was born in 1980s Korea, and the style has since spread to the United States.

What do Koreans believe happens when you eat a bowl of tteokguk on the first day of the lunar calendar?

You become one year older, and the white slices also carry a wish for wealth in the year ahead.

Miyeok-guk, seaweed soup, is traditionally eaten on which occasion?

Birthdays, and new mothers eat it after giving birth.

Songpyeon, half-moon cakes steamed over pine needles, are eaten mainly during which holiday?

Chuseok eve is when whole families shape songpyeon together, before offering some to their ancestors at the holiday's memorial rites.

Naengmyeon is a dish of what?

Cold buckwheat noodles even played diplomat: at the 2018 inter-Korean summit, Kim Jong Un had a Pyongyang chef make them for Moon Jae-in.

Why were wheat noodles served at celebrations such as weddings?

Their length stands for long life, and wheat noodles only became cheap everyday food after government flour campaigns in the 1960s and 70s.

What is jeon?

A savoury pancake, jeon is a holiday staple: families fry heaps of it for Lunar New Year feasts and ancestral rites.

What is doenjang?

Fermented soybean paste is made from the meju solids left once the soy sauce is ladled off, mashed and aged again.

Which Korean dish's name joins the Korean words for seaweed and rice?

Gimbap is generally traced to Japanese norimaki from the colonial era, which Korea made its own.

What is a pojangmacha, where much of Korea's tteokbokki is eaten?

A street stall under a tarp tent, it took off after 1945, feeding workers and late-night soju drinkers.

What is anju?

Food eaten with alcoholic drinks, and eating while drinking slows how quickly the body absorbs the alcohol.

What kind of food is Korean sundae?

A blood sausage, it's often steamed and eaten with slices of steamed liver and lung on the side.

Which Korean food can be filled with kimchi, then steamed, boiled or pan-fried?

Mandu were long part of the royal court's cuisine, yet today they're everyday fare in supermarkets and snack bars.

Roughly how many varieties of tteok are there in Korean cuisine?

Hundreds: over 200 kinds are recorded, and Koreans make and share tteok at feasts and rites of passage, weddings included.

The cold noodle dish kongguksu is served in a broth made from what?

Soy milk broth, served with ice, makes kongguksu a protein-rich way for Koreans to cool off in summer.

The jelly-like Korean dish nokdumuk is made from the starch of which legume?

Mung bean jelly is the base of tangpyeong-chae, a dish said to be tied to King Yeongjo's policy of harmony between feuding factions.

What is biji, the pulp left over from tofu production, usually used for in Korean cooking?

Making a stew is its usual use, and its cheapness is proverbial: 'cheap things are biji cakes' means you get what you pay for.