Noona's dalgona aka ppopgi (뽑기)
Happy Friday, everyone! Today, I want to share our ppopgi (dalgona) recipe. Everyone (including yours truly) has been making the South Korean coffee drink known as Dalgona Coffee, so we thought it’s about time we shared our thoughts and explained what dalgona is.
Dalgona is also called ppopgi, an old-fashioned Korean honey candy and popular throwback street food. Imagine if American honeycomb and toffee had a baby. I clearly have a thing for ppopgi and love making it.
When my mom was in elementary school in Seoul, South Korea, there was a ppopgi vendor outside her school every day and the memory of it brings back a smile. With great excitement, my mother told me how she and her friends would gather around the vendor and watch him melt the sugar, mix it and add baking soda to make the candy. My mother went on to say that the vendor also had a few different patterns he’d press onto the candy before it completely hardened: a star, a fish, a bird. If you ate the candy around the design without cracking it, you would win a free ppopgi! My mother and I laughed the entire time she told me her childhood ppopgi story. It’s the inspiration behind Noona’s Turmeric Honeycomb ice cream aka Little Miss Sunshine.
At Noona’s, we make our own ppopgi and add it to our Turmeric Honeycomb flavor. Our ppopgi is not as sweet, a little denser and slightly darker in color than the American honeycomb you maybe used to. Ribbons of gooey ppopgi and turmeric’s sunshine yellow hue make this flavor an instant favorite. It’s truly a flavor that makes me smile, and I’m happy others feel the same way.
Surprisingly, ppopgi is really easy to make but it does require your undivided attention and patience!
Before getting started, check to see if you have a candy thermometer in your stash of kitchen tools. I’ll admit, I don’t use a candy thermometer to make ppopgi. I eye it, but to successfully do that takes time and experience. If it’s your first time making any temperature-sensitive recipe, I’d invest in a candy thermometer. If you don’t have one and really want to make some ppopgi now, expect to try more than one or two times to get it just right.
INGREDIENTS
3/4 cup (150 grams) sugar
1/8 cup (40 grams) inverted sugar syrup or corn syrup
1/4 cup (2 oz) filtered water
2 tsp (9 grams) baking soda
one squeeze of honey (optional)
pinch of salt
METHOD
Line a 18x13x1 half sheet pan with parchment paper.
Place the sugar, syrup, honey (optional), salt and water into a medium-size, solid-based saucepan over medium-high heat. Let the mixture sit for 30 seconds and then lift the pan up and move it around in circular motion a few times so that the sugar has integrated with the water. It’s best to not stir the actual mixture with your spoon. When you settle the pan back down, lower the temperature to the lowest heat possible. Continue to cook until the mixture turns into a golden sesame color and reaches "hard crack" stage, or 300°F (154°C) on a candy thermometer. It takes me anywhere from 20-28 minutes to get to this point! I set a timer, so I can do other things in the meantime. If it’s your first time, I’d pull up a chair with some ice cream and watch the mixture evolve.
When the color of your honeycomb mixture starts to turn amber, measure out the baking soda and set aside. Have a wooden spoon or spatula ready for use.
As soon as your ppopgi mixture reaches the right temperature or color, pour the baking soda in. With your wooden spoon, quickly whisk to combine evenly; the mixture will begin to foam up like a mini volcano! Remove the saucepan from the heat and spread across the prepared pan in an even layer. Let cool.
Immediately place your saucepan in the sink under hot water, so you don’t have to spend time scrubbing or soaking your pan for days. If you place your pan under hot water right after use, the baking soda residue will lift the hardened candy off of the pan without a single scrub. If you need to scrub anything off of a pan, a little bit of baking soda helps to lift up the stains.
Cool for at least 15 minutes, then pierce the ppopgi all over with a small knife (one that you’d use to cut an apple) to break into pieces.
Store any uneaten ppopgi in an airtight container or ziplock bag, otherwise it will absorb moisture from the air and get sticky and even soften/melt. Enjoy!
Note: Ppopgi will keep for 1 week at room temperature in an airtight container. Do not store in refrigerator. Instead store in freezer to keep for 1 year or even longer.
