A Practical Guide to Korean Food and Korean Fusion Food

Have you seen these pancakes before? They are called Hoddeok, and you can easily spot them on the street, especially in winter in Korea. Hoddeok used to be my favourite street snack when I was a child, yeah I was that spoiled kid who cried for sweet snacks and embarrassed my mom.

The other day, my self proclaimed elves (my sisters) found a Hoddeok recipe and they were busy making them. They somehow miscalculated the amount of the ingredients, so it wasn’t quite as good as it could be, but it was still good for their first try.

So I thought I should compare our Hoddeok with something more professional before I present it to you, and since I haven’t found any Hoddeok carts on the street (I said this is quite a small city on other posts), I decided to compare with one from the factory.

This is the premix packet for Hoddeok and what is inside.

• Product name – Q1 stuffed pancake mix
• Made by – Samyang
• Purchase price – 2500 won (US $2.60) from Homeplus
• Weight – 550g (supposedly able to make 10 pancakes)
• Contents – Premix 396g (left), filling jam mix 150g (right), Dry yeast 4g (centre)

There are instructions on the side of the box in Korean and here are the steps from the box with additional opinions of mine. The extra ingredients you will need are: water 260ml and some vegetable oil.

Step 1. Sieve the premix (the yellowish packet), then add the dry yeast (silver packet) and water, knead it with a wooden spatula.

Step 2. Cover the bowl with wrap, and ferment it for 2 hours at room temperature (20-25 ℃) The volume of the dough needs to increase by 2 times.

Step 3. When the dough is ready, put some oil on your hands (anti stick purpose) and separate an adequate amount of the dough(to allow ten to be made), then put it on your hand.

Step 4. Widen the dough with your hands and put a spoonful of jam mix (the green packet). Seal the dough. Repeat it for the rest of the dough. (You need to spread the dough more than in the picture. Otherwise it is hard to seal properly.)

Step 5. Pre heat the frying pan for 20 seconds and add some oil.

Step 6. Put 2-3 sealed dough balls onto the pan and turn them over when the bottom part is cooked. (Cook them on medium to low heat)

Step 7. Press the dough with a spatula and when the both sides are golden brown you can serve them on the plate.

Recommendation from the packet : It is best if you consume all the fermented dough (dough without the jam mix) when you make it. However if you can’t finish it all, keep it in the fridge (if you are going to consume it within 24 hours), otherwise keep it in the freezer, and defrost it well before you use it.

Review of the product (5 is the highest)

• Price compared to fully homemade version : 2/5 (I think it is expensive to buy this premix packet since I saw how easy it is to make the dough ourselves with easily available ingredients.
• Convenience : 5/5 (Since it is made for convenience, it is a well made product)
• Taste and Flavour : 3.5/5 (It was delicious though was too sweet for me. It has a vanila flavour and slight sense of cinnamon.)
• Side affect – I got three pimples possibly more on my right cheek after having 3 Hoddeok yesterday. I think it is nothing to do with the product, I just had too much of it maybe (As you can guess, it is very sugary and oily). Also, importantly, people who have a peanut allergy shouldn’t have it. It contains powdered peanuts, though it didn’t say how much it has.

By the way, you will see a fully homemade version recipe very soon.

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