Japchae

Japchae was born at a seventeenth-century royal banquet, when a court official served noodles tossed with vegetables to a delighted king, and it has been a celebration dish ever since. Today the glassy sweet potato noodles, called dangmyeon, are stir-fried with beef and a tangle of colorful vegetables and finished with a generous hand of sesame. No Korean holiday table is complete without a big platter of it, and it is the banchan that gets seconds every single time.

Noodles with bounce, shimmer, and a whisper of sesame

The noodles are springy and glossy, each strand coated in a sweet-savory soy glaze, with crisp carrots, spinach, and mushrooms tucked throughout and a deep toasted-sesame finish. It is equally good warm, at room temperature, or cold from the fridge the next day, which makes it the perfect make-ahead dish for a crowd. Use sweet potato starch noodles if you can; their bouncy texture is the whole point, and nothing else chews quite like them. Pile it high and watch it disappear.

Craving more? Explore all Korean Kitchen recipes.

This dish leans on the condiments covered in Beginner’s Guide to Asian Sauces & Seasonings.

Korean recipes →