6 Types of Korean Popular Bibimbap

Posted on May 27, 2017 by Somi

As you might already know the Bibimbap is one of the popular Korean dish and Korean eat the
Bibimbap often. But did you know there are diverse types of Bibimbap that Korean commonly
eat in daily life?

In fact, there are so many types of Bibimbap depends on the ingredients inside but today I will
introduce the most popular 5 types of Korean Bibimbap.

The Bibimbap word could be divided to Bibim(비빔) and Bap(밥). The Bibim means mix and
the Bap means rice. So the Bibimbap means ‘Mixed Rice’. When we eat the Bibimbap first we
have to mix the rice and the other ingredients that this meaning make sense.

1. Jeonju Bibimbap(전주비빔밥)
Jeonju is the region in Korea where located in South. There are many other Korea region’s
Bibimbab, but the Jeonju Bibimbap is the most popular regional Bibimbap.

You can check the Jeonju location in below map. Jeonju is located in south of Korea.
The taste of the Jeonju Bibimbap could be different from the restaurant and the season. There are
about 30 kinds of Jeonju Bibimbap’s ingredients and the ingredients in the bibimbap can be
changed depends on the season. The main ingredients are rice,bean sprouts, gochujang(Korean
red pepper paste), stir-fried beef, egg and sesame oil. These are the basic ingredients that it is like
the fixed ingredient. But the minor ingredients are spinach, bracken, Songi muchroom,green
pumpkin…etc. and these could be changed depend of the restaurant.

The two main characteristics for the Jeonju Bibimbap are in below.

1) The way of making rice

The most common way of making rice is boil rice just with water, but the Jeonju Bibimbbap’s
rice is quite special. They use the meat broth water for making rice. The adventage of using the
meat broth water is the gain of rice does not stick together that it is good to mix the rice with the
other ingredients.
2) Bean sprouts soup

One of the Korean food’s characteristics is the side dish, rice, soup comes together. For the
Jeonju Bibimbap, usually bean sprouts soup is served with the bibimbap.

3) Use the raw egg

Many kinds of Bibimbap use the fried eggs but the Jeonju Bibimbap use the raw egg.

2. Dolsot-Bibimbap(돌솥비빔밥)
Dolsot(돌솥) means the stone pot. Dolsot-Bibimbap is served in a very hot stone pot that the
food is still getting cooked when you are eating. When you are eating you need to be careful as
the Dolsot-Bibimbap is usually really hot!

One of the Dolsot-Bibimbap’s characters is in the Nurungji(누룽지). Nurugji is the crust of

overcooked rice as you can see in below picture.
Dolsot-Bibimbap is keep cooked in hot stone pot even when you are eating that the
Nurungji(=crust of overcooked rice) is naturally made. The Nurungji’s taste is crispy that many
people like it including me.:)
Usually the Dolsot-Bibimbap’s price is little expensive than the normal bibimbap.

3. Yukhoe Bibimbap(육회 비빔밥)

Yukhoe Bibimbap means the raw meat Bibimbap. The origin of the raw meat Bibimbap is in the
Japanese invasions of Korea war on 1592~1598. During the war women made the food and
carried to the soldier but there were no time to prepare the side dish and the soup in separately
that the women gave the lean meat and the seasoned vegetables with the rice. This is how the
raw meat Bibimbap is made.

4. Sliced Raw Fish Bibmbap(회비빔밥)

Raw fish Bibimbap is the Sashimi Bibimbap. In Korean it is called Hoe-Bibimbap(회비빔밥) as
the Hoe(회) means the raw fish. It is also the popular food in Korea. Korea is on the peninsula
that the fish is a major part of Korean cuisine and the Raw fish Bibimbap is the common food.
You can see the raw fish, veggies and rice are mixed in a spoon. Sometimes when people are
eating the raw fish just with dipping in red chili-pepper paste and felt the amount of the raw fish
is lack they mixed the remain raw fish, veggies, rice and mix it. Then the people could not feel
the raw fish is shortage.

5. Bean Sprouts Bibimbap(콩나물 비빔밥)

The characteristic of the Bean Sprouts Bibimbap is in the seasoning. Most of the Bibimbap use
the Goghujang(=red pepper paste) but the Bean Sprouts Bibimbap uses the soy sauce as you can
see in below.

The people who like the spicy food put the dried red pepper powder in the soy sauce.
6. Sanchae Bibimbap(산채비빔밥)

Sanche Bibimbap means the mountain Vegetable Bibimbap. It does not have the meat for the
ingredient. One of the origin of the Sanche Bibimbap is in the Buddhist monk. When the monks
live in the mountain they made the Sanche Bibimbap with using the wild greens ingredients.

One of the popular temple foods in Korea is the Sanche Bibimbap as this food does not use the
meat in ingredients. You can check the mixed Sanche Bibimbap in below.
The sesame oil makes the rice tastes more aromatic and soft.