Mandu-guk

According to the 14th-century history text Goryeosa, mandu had already been introduced via Central Asia during the Goryeo period. Mandu was called sanghwa (쌍화) or gyoja (교자) until the mid-Joseon period. It became a local specialty of the Pyongan and Hamgyong regions, as both wheat and buckwheat – the main ingredients for flour – were mainly cultivated in the north.^[4]

Mandu was made and cooked in various ways, including manduguk. In the Korean royal court, the dish was called byeongsi (병시) while in Ŭmsik timibang, a Joseon-era cookbook, it was called seokryutang (석류탕). It is not known when mandu-guk began to go by its current name.^[5]

Dumplings are made by rolling out thin circles of dough, creating a half-moon shape and filling them with a mixture of minced meat, vegetables, tofu and sometimes kimchi. The dumplings are then boiled in a broth traditionally made by boiling anchovies, shiitake mushroom stems and onions.

Some variations make the broth from beef stock. The addition of tteok, a cylindrical rice cake, is common as well, changing the dish's name into tteok-mandu-guk.^[2][6]

• Tteokguk, rice cake soup
• Kal-guksu, knife-cut noodle soup
• Kreplach, dumpling soup
• Mokthuk, Tibetan soup dumplings
• Jhol momo, Nepalese soup dumplings