How to Make Rice Flour (Maepssalgaru or tteok ssal garu or ssal garu) for Korean Rice Cakes (Tteok) so you can make Songpyeon or other tteoks!
UPDATED 9/22 with new video and more recipe details
I was working on my post for Songypeon recipe yesterday and I realized that if you live outside of Korea, you may have a hard time finding the right kind of rice flour to make the Korean Chuseok Tteok called Songpyeon. Some big Korean stores may sell the special rice flour but that’s not always easy to find.
So I experimented at home to find the best recipe on how to make rice flour from short grain rice – Mepssalgaru 멥쌀가루 or Ssalgaru 쌀가루 for short. This Korean Rice Flour for Rice Cakes is also sometimes called Tteok Ssal Garu 떡쌀가루 for obvious reasons.
I know it’s kind of confusing but they all refer to the same thing; a rice flour or powder made from soaked short grain rice while it is still wet. NOTE, there’s a really confusing thing here. Even I used to get confused before when I didn’t know much about making Tteok.
Ssalgaru can refer to both dry and wet rice flour (sorry for the confusion!)
First, a short Korean vocabulary lesson:
- Ssal 쌀 – rice
- Maepssal 맵쌀 – short grain rice
- Chapssal 찹쌀 – sweet rice
- Garu 가루 – flour or powder
Although there are essentially two different kinds of Rice Flour/Powder in Korean cooking – one that is wet and another one that is completely dry – the name Ssalgaru 쌀가루 can refer to either because they are both rice flours.
The easiest way to distinguish them is where you find it in the store. The wet Ssalgaru (Rice Powder) which actually is a shortened name for Maepssalgaru has larger granules and is always stored frozen at grocery stores because they will go bad pretty quickly due to its moisture content. The dry Ssalgaru (Rice Flour) can be found on regular shelves with other dry grain flours.
Any kind of Korean ssal tteok like Songpyeon are always made from the WET rice flour and NOT dry rice flour/powder.
If you know how to make rice flour for rice cakes, you can use it to make almost any kind of Korean Ssal Tteok (rice cakes) that are made from rice: Sseolgitteok 설기떡, Tteokguk Tteok 떡국떡(rice cake for soups)
and Songpyeon 송편 to name a few.
In case you are wondering, tteoks like Injeolmi, Bukkumi and Hwajeon are made from sweet rice flour or sweet rice. FYI, you can read more about the different rice varieties HERE.
Where can I buy Korean tteok rice flour for Songpyeon?
You can buy frozen Tteok Ssal Garu (Rice Flour for Rice Cakes) from most big Korean grocery stores. If you live near a big Koreatown, there may be a Korean gristmill (방아간 Bang Ah Gaan) nearby or you can go to a Tteok store and ask if they can sell you some fresh wet rice flour.
If not, you can make it home with my recipe below –
How to Make Rice Flour for Korean Rice Cakes (Maepssalgaru for Tteok)
Makes: 4 cups Prep Time: 5 1/2 hrs Cook Time: 10 min Difficulty: Easy
Ingredients
- 2 cup short grain rice (makes a little less than 4 cups fresh rice flour or ssal garu)
- 1/4 tsp fine sea salt
- 5 cups water
- powerful blender/chopper
- Rinse rice 3 times and soak in 5 cups of water for 5 hrs or more.
- When rice is fully soaked, drain for 30 minutes or more until rice is evenly drained with no pools of water in the colander.
Rice draining for Tteok powder - To a blender, 1/2 the soaked rice + 1/4 tsp sea salt. Grind the rice into fine powder. Overall, you should blend at least 3 minutes. Pause 2-3 times during the blending process to scrape off any rice that is stuck to the side that’s not being ground.
Rice Flour-Tteok Ssal Garu for making Korean Rice Cakes Rice should be so fine that the powder should get pasty when you rub it between your fingers. It can still feel a little gritty and that’s OK.
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Tip – I find that it works best when you divide the soaked rice into 2 portions and blend them separately. Too little or too much rice for your blender will not work as well.
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- Using a large sieve, sift the rice powder to remove any larger granules. If you have a lot of large granules, grind them again and sift again.
- Use in the same way as any store bought frozen rice powder (ssal garu) in your recipe but the amount of water needed will most likely be less as this is more FRESH.
STORAGE
Refrigerate for 1-2 days to use for Songpyeon or other Tteok. For longer storage, freeze and it should keep for a couple months at least.
Watch my video on how to make this flour!
Rice Flour (MaepSsalgaru) Recipe for Korean Tteok
Ingredients
- 2 cup short grain rice (makes 4 cups ground rice powder or ssal garu)
- 1/4 tsp fine sea salt
- 5 cups water
- powerful blender/chopper
Instructions
- Soak rice in 5 cups of water for 5 hrs or more.
- When rice is fully soaked, drain for 30 minutes or more until rice is evenly drained with no pools of water in the colander.
- Add to the blender about 1/2 of the soaked rice and 1/8 tsp salt. Grind the rice on high speed into fine powder. Overall, you should blend at least 3 minutes. Pause 2-3 times during the blending process to scrape off any rice that is stuck to the side that's not being ground.
- Rice should be so fine that the powder should get pasty when you rub it between your fingers. It can still feel a little gritty and that's OK.
- Using a large sieve, sift the rice powder to remove any large pieces of unground rice.
- Store rice powder (Ssal Garu) in the fridge for up to 2 days or in the freezer for few months.
Nutrition Information:
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Ooh, I have questiin please. Is the japanese short grain rice ised for sushis, the same when I pulvorized it and make rice flour for tteokbokki? I hope u can answer me. Thank you so so much!
Yes it should work – but you need to follow this recipe for the flour.
Can I use medium-grain rice to make rice flour? It’s a California rice that I actually use to make sushi; it’s quite sticky. Thanks!
Is it Calrose? If it is, it should work OK. Not all medium grain rice may work but if it’s more on the sticky side,it’s probably ok to use. Thanks!
Hello can i use glutinous rice flour for tteok? or do you have other korean recipes which uses glutinous rice flour? i cant find any rice flour nor short grain rice ☺️ thank you so much
Sorry for the late reply. Well, it depends on what kind of tteok you are trying to make. There are 2 types of tteok – one made with glutinous sweet rice flour and another with short grain rice flour. With glutinous rice flour (mochi flour), you can make https://kimchimari.com/injeolmi-rice-cake/ and I have other links within the post. Good luck!
Hi, I know its kinda stupid question but hear me out, is glutenous rice flour/powder same as the short grain rice flour??
Oh it’s not a stupid question and It’s a good question- they are NOT the same. glutinous rice=sweet rice=sticky rice = powder of this grain => glutinous rice powder = chapssal garu=찹쌀가루. Short grain = in korean maepssal = sushi rice => 멥쌀가루 = maepssal garu used to make some types of tteok but not injeolmi. Hope that helps!!
Hi there
I live in South Africa, we don’t have any Korean stores near by. Can I use sushi rice to make the rice flour for rice cakes?
Yes you can – for some rice cakes anyway.
Hi there! Wonderful recipe for rice flour, thanks! When making the actual tteok., the end result turned out grittier than the store bought ones. And yes, i sifted! Could you know what the cause of this may be?
What did you make with it? It could be the recipe but It’s most likely because the flour was not ground fine enough… and it’s hard to get it really fine with a home blender. In Korea, it’s usually ground using a huge commercial grinder at the tteok place and no one grinds it at home.