AI-generated image
Mujigae tteok
Rainbow rice cake
무지개떡 · rainbow layered steamed rice cake
Mujigae tteok is the rice cake of children's birthdays and school picnics in Korea, with soft stripes of pink, yellow, green and white that stand for harmony and happiness; it is also a fixture on the doljanchi first-birthday table. Each layer is the same lightly sweet, fluffy steamed rice flour, coloured naturally. The common mistake is packing the layers down: press too hard and the cake turns dense and the colours bleed, so spread each layer and just level it with a scraper. Rice cakes are chewy and sticky, a known choking risk: cut them into small pieces for young children and older people and eat them sitting down. Chef's tip: colour each portion of flour before sieving it, so the colour is even with no streaks.
- Total time
- 70 min
- Difficulty
- medium
- Serves
- 10
Ingredients
For the rice flour
- 1 ¾ lb wet-milled short-grain rice flourfrozen Korean maepssal garu, thawed; if it is unsalted, add the salt
- 1 tsp salt
- 8 tbsp waterplus a little more as needed
- 3 ½ oz caster sugar
Natural colours
- 1 tbsp freeze-dried strawberry powderpink
- 1 tbsp pumpkin powderor 1 tsp gardenia powder; yellow
- 1 tsp mugwort or matcha powdergreen
- 1 tbsp purple sweet potato powder (optional)purple
Shop this recipe on Amazon
What you'll need
Spices & pantry
Links open Amazon in a new tab. As an Amazon Associate, WhatToEat.Today earns from qualifying purchases.
Method
0/6 doneStep 1: Rub 1 ¾ lb wet-milled short-grain rice flour and 1 tsp salt together and divide equally into 4 bowls (5 if using 1 tbsp purple sweet potato powder).
5 minStep 2: Mix 1 tbsp freeze-dried strawberry powder into one bowl, 1 tbsp pumpkin powder into another, 1 tsp mugwort or matcha powder into a third and 1 tbsp purple sweet potato powder into a fourth, leaving one white. Rub 8 tbsp water into each bowl a spoonful at a time until a squeezed handful holds and breaks cleanly.
15 minStep 3: Push each colour through a sieve twice, rinsing the sieve between colours. Mix a fifth of 3 ½ oz caster sugar into each bowl lightly.
15 minStep 4: Line a 20 cm square or round steamer with a damp cloth. Spread the green layer first, level it gently with a scraper, then add yellow, pink and finish with white (the top layer shows on the platter when inverted). Score into portions.
Step 5: Steam over a strong boil for 25 minutes, then rest off the heat with the lid on for 5 minutes. A skewer should come out clean from every layer.
30 minStep 6: Turn out onto a plate, cool slightly and cut along the score lines. Wrap airtight; eat within a day or freeze.
Nutrition per serving
- Calories
- 260 kcal
- Protein
- 4 g
- Carbs
- 59 g
- Fat
- 0 g
- Fibre
- 1 g
Nutrition values are estimates.
KrazyBadal
Good to know
- How long does mujigae tteok take?
- About 70 minutes in total: 40 minutes to prepare and 30 minutes to cook.
- How many people does it serve?
- 10 as written. Change the servings above the ingredients and every amount scales to match.
- Is it vegan?
- Yes. It has no meat, fish, dairy or eggs.
- Is it gluten free?
- Yes, as written. Check the labels on stock, sauces and spice mixes, which sometimes contain gluten.
- What can I use instead of caster sugar?
- Caster sugar, same amount.
Reviews
No reviews yet. Be the first to cook it.
Rate this recipe
Sign in to rate and review this recipe.
You might also like
Kartoshka cakeCocoa and cake crumb truffles
Soviet cafés and school canteens sold these knobbly brown 'potatoes' for a few kopecks, and they began as a thrifty way to use up sponge and biscuit trimmings at the bakery. Crumbs are bound with butter and sweetened condensed milk, flavoured with cocoa and vanilla, shaped into little potatoes, rolled in cocoa and finished with two dabs of pale butter cream for the sprouts. They are fudgy and dense like a brownie truffle, need no oven, and children love making them. Traditional bakers added a spoonful of rum, an optional extra for adult batches only; this version is alcohol-free with vanilla. The usual slip is coarse crumbs, which make the potatoes crack, so blitz them as fine as sand. Chef's tip: chill the shaped potatoes for at least 20 minutes so they hold their shape and slice cleanly.
Russian
Undu walaluFried urad dal rings in treacle
Walalu means bangles, and these dark, sticky rings of fried urad dal soaked in kithul treacle are a sweet that Sinhala families bring out for Avurudu and for special almsgivings, often made in large batches by an aunt known for her steady hand. A thick, fluffy paste of ground black gram is piped into loops and fried until crisp, then plunged straight into warm treacle, so the rings stay crunchy on the outside while drinking up the syrup. They taste a little like a darker, smokier jalebi, with a toffee finish from the palm treacle. Watery batter is what ruins them; it spreads into flat blobs, so grind the soaked dal with as little water as possible and beat it until light. This recipe uses no asafoetida, so it is naturally gluten free. Chef's tip: pipe the rings onto small squares of baking paper and lower them into the oil paper and all; the paper peels away in seconds.
Sri Lankan
DakjukChicken and rice porridge
All over Korea, dakjuk is the bowl a mother makes on a cold morning or when someone is under the weather: chicken simmered with garlic and ginger, the meat pulled into shreds, and soaked rice cooked down in the broth until it turns into a soft, savoury porridge finished with sesame oil. It is eaten for breakfast or as a gentle lunch, with a little kimchi on the side. The usual mistake is boiling the chicken hard, which clouds the broth and toughens the meat; keep it at a lazy simmer. Chef's tip: fry the soaked rice in sesame oil for two minutes before the broth goes in, so the grains toast lightly and the porridge tastes nutty rather than flat.