The moment the dark, sweet sauce reaches the noodles
Stir soy sauce, sugar, garlic and ginger together in the evening kitchen and a sweet smell rises, a little like yakitori glaze. Add parboiled bone-in chicken and the fat melts into the sauce, and by the end the clear glass noodles have turned brown. Andong jjimdak is not a dish dyed red with chili. It is a Korean feast braise in which a dark soy sauce is soaked up by chicken, potatoes and noodles, all of it headed for a bowl of white rice.
Andong jjimdak (안동찜닭 / Andong jjimdak) is a chicken braise known from Andong in North Gyeongsang Province, Korea. Jjim is used in the names of steamed and braised dishes, and dak means chicken. It is typically made with bone-in chicken, potatoes, carrots, onion, green chili peppers and Korean glass noodles called dangmyeon (당면), all simmered in a sweet-savory soy-based sauce.
The three decisions in a home kitchen are the cut of chicken, the kind of noodle and how concentrated the soy sauce gets. Bone-in chicken pieces come closest, but a mix of drumsticks or wingettes and boneless thighs works too. For the noodles, use Korean sweet potato starch noodles (dangmyeon) rather than mung bean glass noodles if you can. If you are cooking with ordinary dark soy sauce, the color comes up fast, so adjust by how far you reduce the sauce rather than by adding more sugar or syrup.
Among other Korean dishes, it plays a different role from kimchi jjigae (in Japanese), which is a red, sour stew, from bulgogi (in Japanese), which is sweet-savory grilled beef, and from japchae (in Japanese), in which the ingredients are cooked separately and tossed. Andong jjimdak is a big-platter main. You do not need a separate soup: the sauce and noodles left at the bottom of the plate are enough to carry the rice.
In Korean it is written 안동찜닭. In English you will see "Andong jjimdak," "Andong jjim dak" and "jjimdak." This article uses "Andong jjimdak."
From the Andong market to the table: dark sauce, big platter
There is more than one account of where Andong jjimdak comes from. Sometimes it is described as an old celebration dish of Andong; sometimes as a dish that spread in the 1980s along the chicken street of Andong's old market, as chicken restaurants competed with fried chicken shops. Either way, today's Andong jjimdak is not a soup eaten quietly by one person. It is a dish of chicken, vegetables and noodles heaped on a big platter and shared among several people.
When recreating it at home, resist adding more soy sauce just to make it look black. Recipes from Korea use Korean soy sauce, sugar, rice syrup (mulyeot), garlic, ginger and green chilies, and cook over fairly strong heat while the liquid reduces and seasons the dish. If you chase the same color with regular dark soy sauce alone, it turns salty before it turns dark. A slightly lighter color is fine as long as you get the savory depth of the chicken, the sweetness, the green aroma of the chilies and the gloss on the noodles.
| What to protect | How to approximate it | What happens if you substitute too far |
|---|---|---|
| The savor of bone-in chicken | Mix drumsticks or wingettes with boneless thigh | Thigh alone makes the sauce easy but the bone aroma is weaker |
| Korean dangmyeon | Look on the dried noodle shelf of an Asian grocery | Mung bean glass noodles are thin and break up in the braise |
| Green chili aroma | Adjust with shishito, green chilies or Anaheim-type peppers | Chili flakes alone push heat ahead of aroma |
| Dark sweet-savory sauce | Reduce it until it clings | Adding more soy sauce makes it salty |
Ingredients (serves 4)
This serves 4 as a big-platter main. For 2 servings, halve everything and use a deep skillet or shallow pot about 24 cm across. You can make it with bone-in chicken alone, but at home a mix of drumsticks or wingettes and boneless thighs balances cooking time and ease of eating.
This dish contains chicken, soy sauce and oyster sauce (which may contain wheat), soy and sesame. Dried shiitake, Korean glass noodles and seasonings are made on different lines depending on the product, so anyone with a food allergy should check the ingredient labels. When using bone-in chicken, cook it all the way through so that no red juices remain before serving.
What to buy: only the few things that matter
Chicken, potatoes, carrots and onions are available at any ordinary supermarket. What makes a difference is Korean dangmyeon, an aromatic sesame oil, and a thermometer to check that bone-in chicken is cooked through. You do not need Korean green chilies. A mix of shishito peppers, Anaheim-type peppers and a little green bell pepper, keeping the green aroma rather than the heat, is easier to handle at home.
| What to buy | Priority | Why |
|---|---|---|
| Korean dangmyeon | High | Thick and chewy, and does not break up after absorbing the sauce |
| Korean sesame oil | Medium | A little at the end rounds off the heavy sweet-savory sauce |
| Instant-read thermometer | Medium | It is hard to judge bone-in chicken by looks alone |
| Small direct-heat pot | Low | Handy for serving 2 servings piping hot. For 4 servings a deep skillet is easier |
If a Korean grocery is nearby, look at the dangmyeon there first, because thickness and whether it comes pre-cut changes how it handles. A bag labeled 당면 or 자른 당면 (cut dangmyeon) is what you want. If you use ordinary glass noodles, add them at the very end of the braise and stop at about 3 minutes. Longer cooking breaks them into small pieces that clump on the bottom of the plate.
Sesame oil is only 2 teaspoons, added at the finish, but the aroma makes a difference. It also goes into japchae and bibimbap, so it is easy to use up if you keep cooking Korean food.
For 4 servings a deep skillet is easier to stir. If you want to serve 2 servings piping hot at the table, a small pot that can go on direct heat keeps it from cooling.
Bone-in chicken is hard to judge by color alone to see whether it has cooked through the center. When you use large drumettes or cut-up pieces, a thermometer in the thickest part gives peace of mind.
Method
For Andong jjimdak at home, it is more reliable to parboil the chicken first to remove fat and scum than to braise it in the sauce from the start. Do not make the sauce too strong at the beginning. Aim for a sauce that has reduced a little just before you add the noodles. If the noodles go in early, they soak up too much sauce on the bottom of the pot and clump.
Add the Korean noodles last and cook them briefly so they absorb the sauce as they go. If they go in early, they absorb too much sauce, clump and scorch on the bottom of the pot.
Getting closer to the original with what you have at home
Andong jjimdak holds together even when you change some ingredients. But if you substitute in the wrong direction, it slides toward Japanese chikuzenni, yakitori-glazed chicken or noodle-studded nikujaga. What to protect is the chicken fat, the sweet-savory soy sauce, the gloss of the dangmyeon and the aroma of green chilies.
| Hard-to-find ingredient | Close substitute | Substitute to avoid |
|---|---|---|
| Korean soy sauce | 90 ml dark soy sauce with extra liquid | Making it dark with tamari alone |
| Rice syrup | Honey, or a little extra brown sugar | Adding lots more sugar |
| Korean dangmyeon | Thick glass noodles, cooked briefly | Shirataki, rice vermicelli |
| Green chili | Shishito, Anaheim-type peppers, a little bell pepper | Chili flakes alone |
| Bone-in chicken | A mix of drumettes and boneless thighs | Chicken breast alone |
Soy sauce here is not for making the dish dark; it is the base that holds the chicken fat and the noodles. Stop when the sauce tastes slightly sweet from the pot alone, and bring it to a saltiness that is right when eaten with rice. A big platter in Korea is well coated in sauce, but if you imitate that with ordinary dark soy sauce, the salt gets ahead of everything else. If the color is not dark enough, take off the lid and reduce for 1 minute before adding more soy sauce. That alone brings the look and the balance back considerably.
The green chili is not only for heat. Its job is to bring a green aroma and a light bitterness into the sweet soy sauce. When using shishito peppers, slice them on the diagonal, seeds and all, and add them early to bring out the aroma. If you substitute bell pepper, cut it into thin strips and add it only for the last 2 minutes so it does not become too grassy. Dangmyeon is the star that soaks up the sauce. The dish can still be made without it, but on those days think of it as getting closer to a braised chicken and potato dish with noodles, and you will not be disappointed.
For a milder version, swap the green chilies for shishito peppers and add a touch more black pepper. For children, leave out the green chilies and serve chopped green chili or gochugaru only on the adults' plates. Not making the whole pot spicy also helps when you reheat it the next day.
What goes wrong: too salty, too weak, noodles clumped
| Problem | Cause | Fix |
|---|---|---|
| Too salty | Too much soy sauce, or reduced too far | 100 ml water, 1 tsp sugar and more potato, then 5 minutes over low heat |
| Color too pale | Not reduced enough, or noodles added too early | Push the noodles to the edge and reduce 2 minutes over medium heat |
| Noodles clump | Added too early, or too little liquid on the bottom | Add 3 tbsp water and loosen them over low heat for 2 minutes |
| Chicken is tough | Cooked too long over high heat, or too much breast meat | Cover, rest 5 minutes over low heat and spoon sauce over |
| Potatoes fall apart | Cut too small at first, or overcooked | Next time use 3 cm pieces and stop at half-cooked before the noodles |
The most common mistake is adding more soy sauce to make it look black. The blackness comes from the amount of sauce and how far you reduce it. Soy sauce has a clear saltiness, so if the color is pale, take off the lid and reduce over medium heat 1 minute at a time before adding more. Taste not only the sauce but with a bite of rice.
If the noodles have clumped, do not force them apart with chopsticks. Add a little water, warm over low heat and then lift them with tongs. Dangmyeon tighten suddenly as they cool. Keep loosening them gently in the pot until just before serving, and eat soon after moving them to the plate.
Storage and reheating
To store, separate the chicken and vegetables, the noodles and the sauce as much as possible. If everything goes in together, the noodles keep absorbing the sauce and break into short pieces the next day. Keep it in the refrigerator for about 2 days. The chicken and vegetables alone can be frozen, but the noodles lose their texture, so freezing them is not recommended.
To reheat, put the chicken and vegetables in a small pot with 3 tbsp sauce and 2 tbsp water. Warm over medium-low heat for about 4 minutes, and when it bubbles, return the noodles and heat them for just 1 minute. In a microwave, keep the noodles separate and heat the chicken and vegetables at 600 W for 2 minutes, stir, then 1 minute more. Loosen the noodles with boiling water and return them to the sauce at the end, and they are less likely to break.
The next day you can spoon the warmed jjimdak over rice for a small rice bowl. If there is not enough sauce, warm 1 tsp soy sauce, 2 tbsp water and 1/2 tsp sugar in a small pot for 30 seconds and add it. Add sesame oil only as a few drops after reheating; if it goes in at the start, the aroma fades.
Bone-in chicken is hard to judge by looks, so check that the thickest part is cooked through before eating. Reheat stored leftovers until they are steaming hot all the way through.
FAQ
Can I make it with chicken thighs only?
Yes. Cut 900 g boneless thighs into 4 cm cubes and stop the parboil at 30 seconds. Shorten the braise to 8 minutes in step 3 and 10 minutes in step 4. The sauce is lighter than with bone-in chicken, but it is easier to eat and works for lunch boxes. To make up for the missing bone savor, be sure to use the shiitake soaking liquid.
Can I use ordinary glass noodles if I don't have Korean ones?
You can, but the texture will not be the same. With ordinary mung bean glass noodles, reduce to 80 g, skip the soaking and cook only 3 minutes in step 5. Longer cooking breaks them into small pieces that clump on the bottom. If you can find thick glass noodles, they are closer to dangmyeon than mung bean glass noodles are.
Do I add gochujang?
In basic Andong jjimdak, gochujang is not the star. The heat comes from green chilies, black pepper and, if you like, a little dried chili. Gochujang adds sweetness and a fermented flavor and moves it toward a different sweet-spicy chicken braise. If you add it, stay within 1 tsp, an amount that does not spoil the soy sauce flavor.
Can I make it in a pressure cooker?
Yes, but do not pressure-cook the noodles and potatoes. Put in the parboiled chicken, the sauce and the liquid, and stop at 5 minutes at pressure plus 5 minutes natural release. Then move it to a regular pot, simmer the vegetables for 10 minutes and add the noodles last. If everything goes in the pressure cooker from the start, the potatoes fall apart and the noodles break into short pieces.
What goes well with it?
White rice, kimchi, lightly salted cucumber and soybean sprout namul go well. If you add a soup, a light seaweed or radish soup stays out of the way of Andong jjimdak's sweet-savory sauce better than doenjang jjigae, which has a miso-like aroma. If you also set japchae (in Japanese) beside the big platter, the noodles overlap, so on that day favor vegetable sides.
Sources
- Wikipedia, "Andong jjimdak": checked for the outline of the dish (originating in Andong; chicken, vegetables, dangmyeon, soy-based sauce) and the account of its origin on the old market's chicken street.
- My Korean Kitchen, "Jjimdak": checked for the home method of parboiling the chicken, the order of adding vegetables and adding the noodles late.
- The Guardian, "Recipe for Korean soy sauce braised chicken (jjimdak) by Seji Hong": checked for the flavor structure of a modern home version with soy sauce, sugar, ginger, garlic and sesame oil.
