Buldak

Buldak

Buldak
Origin
Place of origin	Korea
Details
Serving temperature	Hot
Main ingredient(s)	Chicken, Tteok

Buldak
Hangul	불닭
Revised Romanization	buldak
McCune–Reischauer	puldak

Buldak is a Korean dish made from heavily spiced chicken. The term "bul" is Korean for "fire" and "dak" translates to "chicken." A decade ago, buldak became famous for its extreme spiciness. Even some Koreans are unable to eat buldak for this reason.

History

South Korea’s long term recession and economic downturn made people seek spicy food in order to relieve stress. Buldak was invented by Fuyuan Foods, which first registered Buldak at a patent office around 2000. In April 2008, however, with the expiration of the original patent, the name Buldak became free for public use. There used to be only one chain of restaurants that served Buldak but now there are many more. Famous Buldak restaurants are Hongcho Buldak, Hwarang Buldak, and Hwaro Buldak. Buldak has led to the development of other dishes inspired from it. In recent years, however, its popularity has somewhat declined.

Preparation and serving

Chicken and tteok (Korean rice cake similar to Japanese mochi) are the main ingredients of this dish. The sauce is a mixture of soy sauce, gochukkaru chili powder, gochujang chili paste, starch syrup, garlic, and cheongyang pepper. Sliced chicken and tteok are then, deep fried and mixed up with the sauce.

Usually, it is served with nurungji and gyeran jjim. Nurungji is the result of boiling the crust of overcooked rice with water whereas gyeran jjim is a Korean steamed egg casserole. These help to calm down after spicy foods. Also, people usually eat Buldak with alcohol such as soju (Korean distilled liquor), dongdongju (Korean rice-wine), and beer.

Varieties

• Cheese buldak — Buldak covered with cheese
• Buldak with bones
• Buldak without bones

See also

• Budae jjigae
• Fried chicken
• List of chicken dishes
• Nurungji