This Korean Comfort Food Will Elevate Your Mac And Cheese To New Chewy Heights

One of my favorite parts about living in South Korea was the food. No matter where I went in Seoul, it was always easy to find something delicious and inexpensive. Though I loved going to restaurants that served traditional meals like soups, fried fish, and dakgalbi (a spicy chicken dish), sometimes I just wanted some comfort food. Luckily, Korean cuisine excels at this too, offering things like the perfectly thin yet crispy Korean fried chicken — which is very different from the American version — or the wacky Korean corn dogs that are sometimes filled with cheese and topped with ingredients like noodles and sugar. 

But nothing, in my opinion, beats cheesy tteokbokki. The traditional version of this dish cooks savory chewy rice cakes (tteok) in a hot sauce mainly made with hot pepper paste (gochujang). Cheese brings gooeyness, saltiness, and a bit of sweetness to the incredible comfort dish. Plates of cheesy tteokbokki got me through many brutally cold winter days when temperatures dropped to -4 degrees Fahrenheit.

Even though it's been several years since I left South Korea, I still love making tteokbokki — and I still always add cheese. This has inevitably led me (and many other home cooks) to wonder what would happen if you did away with the gochujang and just let the tteok drown in pure cheesy goodness. The answer is obvious: Magic happens. This version of mac-and-cheese replaces the macaroni with the chewy texture and neutral taste of tteok, perfectly balancing the saltiness and creaminess of cheese.

In South Korea, cheese is typically added to bring down the heat of tteokbokki. This is, in part, what makes it so popular amongst foreigners. It's also one of the reasons why tteok and cheese work so well together. Don't get me wrong, it's not that the original recipe needs improvement. It's just that there are times when your stomach wants comfort food but can't take late-night spiciness, or when the summer heat makes you want to avoid hot dishes that'll make you sweat. This twist on two classic dishes isn't meant to replace tteokbokki or mac-and-cheese. Instead, it works for when you're craving something that is new yet comforting, and exciting yet not overly spicy. It takes the best of both dishes and melds it into a single, perfect comfort meal.

You don't have to do away with spice completely either. Some recipes call for only tteok and different types of cheese like parmesan and cheddar. If you don't feel like dealing with heat, this will be just right. Those who want a hint of spice can add a tablespoon of gochujang, which I strongly believe makes everything better, from spicy breakfast burritos to boring soups and rice and beans. Another tasty spin on a spin is to take rabokki (tteokbokki with ramen), and change the gochujang sauce for lots of cheese to make tteok-ramen-and-cheese. I call this ultimate indulgence raok-and-cheese, and it really is as good as it sounds.