Rabokki is a combination of rice cakes and ramen noodles in a sweet and spicy sauce. It’s literally one of my favorite snacks!
Rabokki is a popular street food, perfect for after-school or after-work snack. It’s essentially tteokbokki combined with instant ramen making a sweet, spicy, filling, and tasty dish!
This dish brings back so many memories because I used to make this for my sister and me when we were kids. It uses only a handful of ingredients, all done in one pan, just super easy to make.
I’m proud of this recipe not because I am a chef, but because I made the perfect sauce when I was 9. Ever since, I’ve never made rabokki any other way again.
Ingredients for Rabokki
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- Rice Cakes – These are chewy cylinder sticks made from rice flour. It’s a little bit sweet, and a little bit bland, but carries any sauce really well. Other dishes we like to use this in are Rice Cake Soup, Royal Court Tteokbokki, Rice Cake Skewer, etc.
- Ramen – I highly recommend using Shin Ramen. This is what I’ve used ever since because it has just the right spicy and savory flavor and has a great noodle texture.
- Fish Cake – These are fried sheets of minced fish, vegetables, and seasonings then frozen to be added in stir-fries or soups or this! You can skip this if you can’t find them, but tteokbokki just goes automatically with fish cake.
Rabokki Sauce
The rabokki sauce is a combination of 5 tablespoons of gochujang, 3 tablespoons of sugar, and a third of the ramen soup packet in 3 cups of water. Simple as that.
For this recipe, it’s all about the ratio of the sauce. The gochujang is spicy and savory, so it needs the balance from the sugar. Any more or less of these two, in my opinion, won’t taste good. Having said that, you can’t make this less spicy.
People often ask why I always use sugar in my recipes. First, Korean food is about sweet and spicy, it’s always the balance of the two. Second, this is street food, it’s part of the culture—it wasn’t made to be healthy, it was made to satisfy and comfort everyone who buys it. And third, you can always use your preferred sweetener, whether it’s a sugar substitute or honey.
Use only a bit of the soup packet because you don’t want this to taste like ramen, you want it to taste like a leveled-up tteokbokki where people will ask, “Woah! Why is this so good?” That’s the secret!
How to make Tteokbokki with Ramen?
Place pan on high heat, add water, gochujang, and sugar. Mix this thoroughly and bring it to a boil.
Once boiling, add the rice cakes and bring it to a boil again.
Add the ramen, dried vegetables, soup packet, and fish cakes. Cook the ramen for 5-6 minutes. The sauce may look a lot at this point, but the noodles will eventually absorb it.
Once the rice cakes are soft, the ramen is cooked to your liking, and the sauce has thickened, serve right away and enjoy!
Serving Rabokki
Consume rabokki while it’s hot so everything is soft and saucy. The rice cakes may harden and the sauce may continue to thicken up as it gets cold.
Honestly, I serve this by itself and add nothing more because it’s already great and satisfying on its own. Nevertheless, you can always pair it with fried dumplings, vegetable twigim, hard-boiled eggs, or sausages. These are just some protein or vegetable options you can serve with the dish.
Other Korean street foods you might like:
Make sure to leave a rating, a comment, or tag me on Facebook, Instagram, or Tiktok when you chop them up! Yeobosayo!
Easy Rabokki (Tteokbokki with Instant Ramen)
Ingredients
- 300 grams Rice Cake
- 1 pack Ramen
- 2 sheets Fish Cake Chopped into triangles or thick strips
- 3 cups Water
- 5 tbsp Gochujang
- 3 tbsp Sugar
Instructions
- Place pan on high heat, then combine water, gochujang, and sugar in it. Mix it thoroughly and bring it to a boil.
- Once the sauce is boiling, add the rice cakes.
- Once the rice cakes are boiling, add ramen, dried vegetables, soup packet, and fishcake.
- Let it boil until the rice cakes are soft, ramen is thoroughly cooked, and the sauce has thickened.
- Serve hot and enjoy!
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