← Nouns Cooking · Korean

Ingredients

• 250 g plain flour
• ¼ tsp Salt
• ½ tsp Cinnamon
• 4 tbsp Toasted sesame oil
• 4 tbsp Honey
• 4 tbsp soju or sake
• 1 tsp Ginger, finely grated
• 300 ml rice syrup (jocheong) or golden syrup
• 120 ml Honey
• 150 ml Water
• 30 g Ginger, thinly sliced
• 1 tsp Cinnamon
• 1 l oil, for frying
• 1 tbsp Pine nuts, chopped, to garnish (optional)

Method

1. Make the syrup first: simmer the water and sliced ginger for 10 min, add the rice syrup and honey and simmer for 5 min more. Stir in the cinnamon, take out the ginger and let it cool.
2. Mix the flour, salt and cinnamon, add the sesame oil and rub it in with your fingertips until it feels like damp sand.
3. Mix the honey, soju and grated ginger, pour it over the flour and gently press everything together into a dough. Do not knead, or the cookies turn hard; folding and pressing it 3 or 4 times gives flaky layers.
4. Roll the dough 1 cm thick and cut it into 4 cm squares (or press it into yakgwa moulds). Prick each piece right through a few times with a skewer.
5. Heat the oil to only 110°C (230°F) and fry the cookies for 10–12 min, until they float and puff open into layers. Raise the heat to 140°C (285°F) and fry for 5 min more, until deep golden brown.
6. Drain them briefly, then drop the hot cookies straight into the cool syrup. Leave them to soak for at least 4 hours.
7. Lift them out onto a rack to drip, then sprinkle with pine nuts.

Tips

• Low oil temperature is the secret: if the oil is too hot the outside browns before the inside cooks and they stay raw and hard.
• They keep for a week in an airtight box, and get chewier as they sit.

Sources

Written in our own words after cross-checking these recipes:

Kimchimari Beyond Kimchee