North Korea

A thick, pan-fried pancake made primarily or exclusively from buckwheat flour — a highland staple of Bhutan (where it is called khule) and a traditional preparation of the Korean Peninsula — valued for its earthy, slightly bitter grain character and its status as an everyday bread substitute in buckwheat-growing highland communities.

A soft, chewy Korean rice cake made from pounded glutinous (sticky) rice, eaten plain or wrapped around a sweet red-bean filling.

Corn porridge is a slow-cooked maize-flour porridge, thinned to drinkable or cooked thick, eaten plain or sweetened, often as a morning meal.

A North Korean everyday staple of dried field-corn kernels cooked together with short-grain white rice, historically eaten when pure white rice was scarce or rationed.

A Korean everyday stew built on a base of aged fermented soybean paste (doenjang) dissolved into anchovy-kelp broth, simmered with tofu, zucchini, and aromatics in a clay pot until deeply savory.

A slow‑simmered broth made primarily from dog meat, seasoned with perilla leaves, green onions, and chili pepper, served as a hearty main‑course soup.

A clear Korean soup of fish-paste cakes (eomuk) simmered in a light anchovy-and-kelp broth, eaten as an everyday warming staple.

A North Korean street snack in which a thin sheet of pressed soybean-protein 'artificial meat' is wrapped around a small bolus of seasoned steamed rice and topped with a spicy red sauce.

A Korean fermented vegetable condiment, most canonically made from napa cabbage salted to draw moisture, then coated in a spiced paste of gochugaru, garlic, ginger, and fermented seafood, and left to lacto-ferment.

A light Korean soup of aged kimchi simmered in a clear water or pork-bone broth, served with rice.

A bowl of long, thin, predominantly buckwheat noodles served ice-cold in a crystal-clear blend of dongchimi (radish water kimchi) brine and beef bone stock, topped sparingly with sliced boiled brisket, julienned cucumber, sliced Korean pear, and a halved hard-boiled egg.

A North Korean dish of steamed rice in warm chicken broth, topped with shredded chicken, egg, mushrooms, and savory garnishes.

A formal Korean meal set presented all at once — a bowl of rice, a soup, and a counted array of small side dishes — served as a complete coordinated table rather than a single dish.

A North Korean noodle dish of chewy hand-pulled potato-starch noodles served in a simple soy- or broth-based seasoning.

Pyongyang Cold Noodles are thin buckwheat noodles served in a clear, ice‑cold beef broth, topped with sliced beef, cucumber, and a half‑boiled egg, and seasoned with mustard and vinegar.

Thick cuts of pork belly or shoulder charcoal-roasted Pyongyang style and served with raw garlic and fermented soybean paste.

An elaborate Korean royal-court hot pot of meticulously arranged meats, vegetables, eggs and pine nuts simmered in broth in a dedicated charcoal-chimney brass vessel.