Tteok

Tteok is a Korean sweet cake made with glutinous rice flour(also known as sweet rice or chapssal), by steaming. Normal rice flour can be used for some kinds of tteok. There are hundreds of different kinds of tteok eaten year round. Some common ingredients for many kinds of tteok are mug bean, red bean, and sweet red bean paste, Korean mugwort, jujube and other dried fruits, sesame seeds and oil, sugar, and pine nuts. Tteok are largely divided into four categories, such as "steamed tteok", "pounded tteok", "boiled tteok" and "pan-fried tteok". The steamed tteok is made by steaming rice or glutinous rice flour in "siru", or a large earthenware steamer, so it is often called "sirutteok". It is regarded as the basic and oldest form of tteok. The pounded tteok is made by using a pounding board or mortar after steamed first. In making pan-fried tteok, the rice dough is flattened like a pancake and pan-fried with vegetable oil. The shaped tteok are made by kneading a dough with hot water which is usually shaped into balls.


Steamed tteok
The main ingredients for steamed tteok or "sirutteok" are rice or glutinous rice and sometimes they are mixed together. In some cases, other grains, beans, sesame seeds, wheat flour , or starch can be mixed with the rice. Various fruits and nuts are used as subsidiary ingredients. In additon, vegetables with flavors or herbs can be used to flavor the tteok and honey and sugar are used as sweeteners.
Baekseolgi (백설기) - a variety of siru tteok. It literally means white snow tteok which is made of white rice.
Mujigae tteok (무지개떡)- literally "rainbow tteok"; this variety of tteok has colorful stripes. The tteok is used especially for Korean banquet, party, or feast like dol (celebrating a baby's first birthday), Hwangap(celebrating 60 years old people's birthday), or wedding party.


Pounded tteok
In the traditional preparation, pounded tteok is made by pounding rice or glutinous rice with utensils called jeolgu and jeolgutgongi or tteokme and anban. Injeolim (tteok coated with bean powder), garaetteok (가래떡 cylinder-shaped white tteok), jeolpyeon (절편 patterned tteok) and danja (단자 glutinous tteok ball coated with bean paste)” are commonly eaten pounded tteok.


Shaped tteok

• Ggul tteok (꿀떡) - literally means "honey" but the tteok is stuffed with Korean syrup. Ggul tteok is similar to songpyeon in shape, but smaller in size
• Songpyeon - eaten during Chuseok holiday, Korean thanksgiving day
• Gochitteok (고치떡)
• Ssamtteok (쌈떡) - tteok used for ssam (쌈, food wrapped in a leaf)
• Gyeongdan' - Inside these rice balls are usually red bean or sesame paste. The balls are usually dipped and cover in black sesame or other powders.

Tteokguk
Tteokguk is a traditional Korean dish eaten during the celebration of the Korean New Year. The dish is comprised of the broth/soup within which is placed several thinly sliced rice cakes(tteok). It is a tradition to eat tteokguk on New Years because it is believed to grant the consumer luck for the forthcoming year and for him or her to supposedly gain an additional year of life. Additional ingredients are usually added to the dish; these include thinly sliced cooked eggs, marinated meat, mandu(dumpling), and/or dried seaweed for seasoning.