Name: Fish Cake Soup (Odeng Soup)
Prep time: 3 min
Cook time: 40 min
Total time: 43 min
Ingredients: 6 cups water; 1 oz dried anchovies ((a handful)); 5 oz Korean radish ((mu)); 0.5 oz Dried Kelp ((Dashima or Kombu, 4"x 6" size for 1/2 oz)); 3/4 tsp sea salt; 1 tsp Korean soup soy sauce ((Guk ganjang)); 2 tsp cooking sake or mirin; 1 pack fish cake ((approx 20 oz / 567 g)); 2 each green onions ((chopped)); 3 stalks chrysanthemum leaves ((ssukat))

Fish Cake Soup (Odeng Soup) is one of the most favorite comfort food for Koreans. It can be enjoyed by itself or goes wonderfully with bunsik style foods like tteokbokki and spicy bibim noodles.

Fish Cake Soup - Korean Odeng Guk — Fish Cake Soup – Korean Odeng Guk

Fish cake soup is also known as Odeng Guk or Eomuk Guk in Korea. The word Odeng originally comes from the Japanese word Oden (おでん) (‘Japanese one-pot winter dish consisting of several ingredients such as boiled eggs, daikon, konjac (kelp), and processed fishcakes stewed in a light, soy-flavored dashi broth‘ Wikipedia). There’s a slight change in meaning here though.. Japanese Oden refers to the one-pot dish containing fish cakes whereas in Korean culture, Odeng refers to the fish cake ITSELF. Eomuk on the other hand is the pure Korean word, with Eo meaning fish, Muk meaning cake like state, similarly used in the name Dotori-muk.

Interestingly, even though these two soups are basically called the same thing, the Korean and Japanese fish cake soups taste somewhat different. Both soups start with the same basic dashi broth made from dried anchovies, radish and kelp but it is seasoned differently. Japanese style oden soup has a darker color because it’s seasoned mostly with Japanese dark soy sauce and will be sweeter tasting. Korean style eomuk guk (어묵국) is lighter in color and is seasoned with both salt and Korean soup soy sauce (guk ganjang). Both taste good in their own way but with Korean bunsik, the Korean style eomuk guk definitely tastes better together. 😉

How to enjoy Fish Cake Soup (Odeng Soup) – Korean Style

Serve Korean fish cake soup with bunsik like tteokbokki, bibim noodles or twigim
Serve with fish cake soup with some rice, kimchi and other banchan like myeolchi bokkeum or ojingeoche
Add udon noodles to fish cake soup and enjoy it as Odeng Guksu.
If you have seen any Korean drama that involves someone broken hearted, drinking in some makeshift tent restaurant (pojang macha 포장마차), you would have seen people drink this fish cake soup in-between drinking soju and either crying their eyes out or yelling because they are angry… 😝 😜 It is Korean drama’s most favorite scene for showing that someone is having a rough time. HAHAHA..
OH BTW, DO NOT USE the package soup powders that come with many Odeng packages. They are full of MSG.

What’s in a fish cake?

A high quality fish cake is made mostly from fish meat and sometimes includes ground fish bones. The fish can be sea bream, or other white fish – some seasoning and usually flour as a binding agent. Some fish cakes contain MSG so you may want to check that if that is a concern. The ground fish batter mix is then shaped and then deep-fried. It is then cooled and frozen or refrigerated for distribution.

In my opinion, the best fish cakes are the ones that are freshly made, fried and served right as they come out of the fryer. As a kid I remember following my mom to our local market and tasting the freshly made Odeng that was sold right as the seller was making it. I remember thinking that this tasted sooo different from the ones that comes in packages. Odeng was one of my mom’s favorite snack to have in the car on our way back home from the market.

I remember my mom saying to me with a smile as we are both eating –

“It’s funny how this Odeng will not taste as good once we go home and eat it. So we should eat it now, right?”

Fish Cake Soup (Odeng Soup) Recipe

Servings: 2-3 Cook Time: 40 minutes Difficulty: EASY

Instructions

Peel and cut Korean radish (mu) in big chunks. It should weight about 5-6 oz (150 g).
In a large pot, add 6 cups water, cut radish, a handful of dried broth anchovies (gukmul myeolchi 국물멸치) and one large piece of dried kelp (dashima 다시마).
Anchovy Kelp Broth for Fish Cake Soup
Simmer for 30 minutes. Remove dried kelp and anchovies. Leave the radish or cut into smaller pieces so it can be served with the fish cakes.
While broth is simmering, chop green onions. If you can buy ssukat (chrysanthemum leaves), garnish with them also for extra aromatic flavor.
Add fish cake, bring to boil and then quickly bring down to simmer for another 10 minutes.
Fish Cake Soup -Boiling

The fish cakes I am using are the skewered kind called Kkochi Eomuk 꼬치어묵 or Kkochi Odeng 꼬치오뎅. But you can use any fish cake you like. FYI, here’s what I used by Sempio.

Fish Cake -Korean Odeng Skewers
Serve in a bowl. Garnish with green onions and ssukat. Also serve soy sauce and yellow mustard or wasabi on the side so it can be mixed with soy sauce. Odeng tastes great when dipped in soy sauce mixed with mustard or wasabi.

Odeng Soup - Korean Fish Cake soup — Odeng Soup – Korean Fish Cake soup

Notes

Check out my Know your Soy Sauce link to find out more about Korean soup soy sauce (Guk Ganjang).
Add more salt/guk ganjang (soup soy sauce) to taste.
To spice things up a bit, sprinkle some gochukaru (Korean red chili pepper powder).

If you can buy uncut Korean rice cakes for soups, you can put them on skewers and cook with your fish cakes. Do not cook the rice cakes too long though since they will start to melt in the soup. Just add it in the last 3-4 minutes of cooking.