Tteokbokki is chewy rice cakes cooked in a red, spicy broth. It’s a popular Korean street food. When I was a student coming home from school it was hard to resist the spicy rice cakes sold by vendors on the street! They would have big vats of tteokbokki and just kept stirring and stirring it, making it more and more delicious over time. We would stop by and they would give us a small paper cup of spicy rice cakes dripping the spicy, slightly sweet sauce for a very reasonable price that any student could afford. We just couldn’t resist it! The sauce is fiery hot and a little sweet, and the rice cakes don’t have much taste but they are a little soft and a little gooey.
For a lot of my readers who’ve never had it before, it looks like pasta in tomato sauce, but it doesn’t taste like that at all.
When I lived in Korea I learned the secret to making good tteokbokki from a famous place in the local market. It was run by an old lady who could always be found stirring her pot of tteokbokki, and there were always people lined up to buy it.
She prepared it right in front of us, so I saw she first made an anchovy stock from dried anchovies. I made tteokbokki at home and found it made a huge difference in flavor. I once ran out of dried anchovies and made tteokbokki without it, and it didn’t taste at all like what I was expecting. So don’t forget to always make a good stock with dried anchovies when you make this! It totally makes this dish!
There are many variations of the Romanized English spellings of tteokbokki (떡볶이): ddeokbokki, dukbokki, tteok-bokki and on and on. A few years ago the Korean government tried to standardize the name as “topokki” and even asked me to change it everywhere on my website! It just sounded weird to me so I never did it. How do you pronounce it? The first two t’s are a hard t, and the eo sounds more like a u.
There are also many variations of the tteokbokki recipe too: some people add dumplings (mandu), some add cabbage, cheese (mozzarella cheese seems popular), or ramen noodles. Creamy, saucy rosé tteokbokki was popular for a while, and a few hundred years ago the Korean royal court enjoyed nonspicy, soy sauce based gungjung tteokbokki. This version below of the spicy Korean rice cakes is an authentic classic and my favorite. Everyone loves it, so let’s make tteokbokki!
Ingredients
- 1 pound of cylinder shaped rice cake (tteok), fresh or frozen, bought or homemade. (Use a little more if you’re not adding hard boiled eggs and fish cakes)
- 4 cups of water
- 7 large size dried anchovies, with heads and intestines removed
- 6 x 8 inch dried kelp
- ⅓ cup hot pepper paste (gochujang)
- 1 tablespoon Korean hot pepper flakes (gochugaru) aka “Korean chili flakes”
- 1 tablespoon sugar
- 3 green onions (scallions), cut into 3 inch long pieces
- 2 hard boiled eggs, shelled (optional)
- ½ pound fish cakes (optional)
Directions
Cook time: 15mins for the anchovy broth and 10-15mins for tteokbokki
- Add the water, dried anchovies, and dried kelp to a shallow pot or pan.
- Boil for 15 minutes over medium high heat without the lid.
- Combine gochujang (hot pepper paste), gochugaru (hot pepper flakes), and sugar in a small bowl.
- Remove the anchovies and kelp from the pot and add the rice cake, the spicy mixture in the bowl, the green onion, and the optional fish cakes and hard boiled eggs. The stock will be about 2½ cups.
- When it starts to boil, stir gently with a wooden spoon. Let it simmer and keep stirring it until the rice cake turns soft and the sauce thickens and looks shiny. It should take about 10 to 15 minutes. If the rice cake is not soft enough in that time, add more water and continue stirring until it softens. Freshly made rice cakes will soften faster so if you use frozen rice cakes, thaw them out and soak them in cold water first, to soften them up before cooking with them.
- Remove from the heat and serve hot. If you have any leftovers, keep them in the fridge and reheat them when you want to eat. They won’t be as good as when you first made them, but not bad. You should finished them in a few days, but it’s best to eat them all at once right after you make them.
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I really like Weee! they deliver quality packaged and fresh Korean ingredients to the continental USA. Cheaper and better than Amazon! Check them out!
I’ve been watching you since I was 11, and now Im 18 writing a report using you as a reference time really flys! Thanks for all the amazing recipes over the years!
Hi Katyyy,
Since you started watching my videos from when you were 11, you must have been really interested in cooking. The tteokbokki and fish cake skewers look really well made! Cheers!
Hi Maangchi ☺️
I tried it today and it was really tasty! The best tteokbokki I ever made. Thank you for all your recipes and very clear instructions. I look forward to making many more of your recipes.
Thank you
Your tteokbokki looks fantastic! Cheers! : )
I’ve tried several of your recipes in the past and have really enjoyed them. They’re pretty easy to follow and some of your variations are nice. It would be nice to have a easier format to make printing your recipes out better. I like to keep copies of the ones I really enjoy and it’s not as easy to do with the version this website uses, if that makes sense. I look forward to trying more of your recipes.
Hi Maangchi. I went to my local Korean store and found dried anchovies, however I also found Korean Anchovy Stock that has kelp in it. Do you think that this stock would work in place of the dried anchovies? I miss tteokbokki so much from my time studying in Korea, I’d love to make it.
Thanks!
Hey there – I just made this dish this evening. I bought what is essentially a teabag of dried anchovies, as well as a bag of dried kelp from Amazon.
Here are the anchovies: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B07KKKHCDX?psc=1&ref=ppx_yo2ov_dt_b_product_details
As far as weight goes, I Googled how much an average anchovy weighs and it said 3g. So I think for this recipe, you’d want about 21 grams of anchovy.
The anchovies I bought weigh 10 grams, but the instructions read 1 bag per 1L (or about 4 cups of water, as the recipe calls for). Either one will work.
That being said, if you want to use that stock, make sure you’re reading the instructions on it – it’s possible it’s concentrated and you’d need to dilute. Give it a go – worst case scenario, it’s either a little too fishy, not just barely not fishy enough.
Hi! This looks amazing, I’m super excited to try it! I can only find small and medium dried anchovies in my area though, do you have a measurement in grams that I could use? I’m not sure how many medium anchovies equal one large, and I don’t want to use too few or too many. Thank you for sharing this recipe! <3
I really enjoy this recipe. Recently I’ve taken to adding zuchinni, green beans and pork belly to make a full meal out of it.
Hi Maangchi!
I’m a big fan of instant topokki pots, so I picked up some frozen plain tteobokki in the hopes of replicating something as delicious, for half the store-bought price.
I really wanted to attempt your stock but getting my hands on dried anchovies around me is kinda hard. I subbed in some dashi broth instead and thought it tasted fantastic!
Got your site bookmarked ready to make some more of your delicious creations <3
“I subbed in some dashi broth instead and thought it tasted fantastic!” It sounds fantastic, my friend! : )
Hello…. is there a way to maje it without the gochujang and gochugaru? A replacement… for the color i could use paprika… i am not into spicy food… but i just love asian cuisine… all other spices and flavours are amazing and resemble my caribean cooking a bit.
Thank you fornyour help.
Today was a perfect day to make a large batch! I had fish cakes that needed to be used up. Love all of your recipes. The only change I make in this one is I sub maple syrup for the sugar! 감사합니다.
Thank you for the awesome recipe Maangchi! Here’s my first homemade tteokbokki right before it was done and topped with cheese! Next time I’ll make the tteok myself.
Congratulations! Your tteokbokki looks wonderful!
This was a super easy recipe to follow and tastes great. I couldn’t find any large dried anchovies at my local Korean grocery so I went with a packaged dashi stock base. I am pleased with the way it turned out, better than the restaurant versions I’ve had.
I have just made my first batch of tteokbokki and it is absolutely delicious. I didn’t have any fishcakes to add so instead I threw in a couple of handfuls of prawns, squid and mussels. This is sooooo savoury and I am pleased I was able to make the anchovy and kelp stock because it gives it a real depth of flavour. Nice and spicy too mmmmmmmmmmmm. Thank you so much for the recipe. I am so disappointed that my laptop will not let me upload the picture of it though unfortunately.
Your homemade tteokbokki sounds very delicious! Yes, a few dried anchovies will give a real depth of flavor! : )
i loved it!!☺️☺️
it was great and was perfectly balanced.
will definitely make again!!^^
note: I also made kimbap but it’s a little bit ugly
Mouthwatering! The gimbap looks so delicious! Don’t say it’s a little bit ugly. : )
Hi Maangchi,
My husband and I moved from NY to Louisiana due to his work.
I used to be able to get rice cakes from H Mart but I can’t find any in Louisiana, Baton Rouge specifically.
Do you know of any online shops that carry them?
HMart unfortunately doesn’t ship to Louisiana for some reason.
Any information would be appreciated.
Thank you
Check out a list of Korean grocery stores in Baton Rouge, Louisiana here. https://www.maangchi.com/shopping/us/louisiana
Whenever I move or travel to a new place, the first thing I want to know about is where to find my Korean cooking ingredients. Good luck with finding rice cake! You can make your own rice cake, too. https://www.maangchi.com/recipe/garaetteok/
This recipe is delicious. The fish cake just got a little too big
Your spicy rice cakes and fish cake are making my mouth water, even though it’s early in the morning. : ) Thanks for sharing the photo!
Hi Shelly! Fellow Louisianian here. There are lots of really great Asian markets in Baton Rouge. They’re just hidden. There’s one off of Florida Boulevard called Asian Supermarket. They have a great collection of goodies to check out!
Amazing recipe as usual! Easy to cook and very delicious
Easy & good. No modifications!
Mouthwatering! I love that there is lots of broth in your tteokbokki!