Tteokbokki is a highly popular Korean street food and a portion of delicious comfort food. You can make it at home with this easy tteokbokki recipe. The spicy, slightly sweet, and chewy rice cakes are simply addictive!

Korean Spicy Rice Cake

What is tteokbokki?

Literally translated as “stir-fried rice cake,” tteokbokki (떡볶이) is a beloved Korean rice cake dish with many variations and rich history.  It’s also spelled ddukbokki, ddeokbokki, dukbokki or topokki. This spicy rice cake dish is enormously popular as a street food and is also often enjoyed at home.

Korean Spicy Rice Cake

Unlike gungjung tteokbokki , which has been around for hundreds of years, the red spicy tteokbokki has a relatively short history. It was developed in 1953, the year the Korean War ended, by a woman named Ma Bok-rim in the Sindang-dong neighborhood in Seoul. The chewy rice cake in a spicy gochujang sauce instantly became popular as an affordable comfort snack.

Korean Spicy Rice Cake

Why We Love This

If you love Korean street food, you’ll love this amazing homemade tteokbokki recipe! It’s cheap to make, flavourful, and deliciously filling, perfect as a spicy meal for lunch, dinner, or as a quick and easy snack.

The simple stock base features powdered dashi along with classic Korean ingredients like Korean chili flakes and gochujang paste. 

Keep it simple with just the essential garage-tteok rice cakes, or adapt the recipe with extra ingredients like Korean fish cakes or leftover veggies from the fridge.