Recipe: Dalgona Coff ee

Dalgona Coff ee

Today’s Internet Trend

Written and photographed by Viktoryia Shylkouskaya

Dalgona (달고나), real dalgona, is a Korean street food that is believed to have fi rst appeared in Korea in the 1960s in Busan, the second largest city in the country. Th is treat is sweet and has been translated as “honeycomb toff ee.” It tastes a bit like butterscotch but has a peanut brittle-like feeling. Variations of this snack exist all around the world but is known by many diff erent names, such as “sponge candy” in New York and Pennsylvania, “cinder toff ee” in Britain, “angel food candy” in Wisconsin, “sea foam” in California and Maine, and karume-yaki in Japan.*

What Is Dalgona Coff ee? Dalgona coff ee is a whipped coff ee beverage made with instant coff ee, sugar, water, and milk. When I fi rst heard about it, I thought it made so much sense for Koreans. Instant coff ee is everywhere; it’s not great, but it’s not totally bad. It’s just super common. Th ere are instant coff ee machines at restaurants so that when you depart aft er a meal, you can get a little Dixie cup of instant coff ee to go, and they’re in subway stations, so you can get a big gulp before the next train arrives. When I fi rst saw the viral challenge, I assumed someone thought they’d try making instant coff ee good and came up with this since they had a lot of free time on their hands.

What you need to know, however, is that what has been named “dalgona coff ee” by internet fi ends, is actually “beaten coff ee,” which is a common Indian coff ee beverage. It got the name “beaten coff ee” in India because of the process of beating the instant coff ee and sugar to aerate the mixture over and over again. Th e only diff erence is that oft en the paste-like substance is put in the glass fi rst and then warm milk is poured over top of it. If you’ve already tried the dalgona challenge…now you want to try it again this way, don’t you?

Much like one of my language teachers taught us in school, once everyone agrees on a name for something, it is what it is. If we all decided to suddenly start calling tables “apples,” well then, tables would be apples. So, I guess “beaten coff ee from India” is going to be known as “dalgona coff ee from Korea” from now on because hundreds of thousands of people online have deemed it so. Where Did the Term “Dalgona Coff ee” Come

From?

Th e current viral trend is not really dalgona coff ee but was given the moniker aft er a famous actor mentioned the similar taste. Th e craze sweeping TikTok and Instagram began when Jung Il Woo ( 정일우), a Korean actor you might recognize from Unstoppable High Kick, 49 Days, Cool Guys, Hot Ramen, Cinderella with Four Knights, and Moon Embracing the Sun, went to Macau and tried a whipped coff ee based on the Indian drink called “Phenti Hui” or “Indian cappuchino.” Aft er having the beverage, he came back to Korea, went on the show Stars’ Top Recipe at Fun-Staurant in January 2020 and talked about this whipped coff ee drink he had and how it reminded him of dalgona, a common street food in Korea. Th us, the name was born and the rest is history. So, now there are two dalgona coff ees, this viral challenge sweeping the internet under the hashtag #DalgonaCoff eeChallenge that is really based off of the coff ee drink from India mentioned above and an actual dalgona coff ee that has existed for some time and was created by a cafe in Seongsu-dong, the Brooklyn of Seoul.

Dalgona coff ee ready to drink.

2 tablespoons instant coff ee (Do not use ground coff ee beans.) 2 tablespoons sugar (I used brown sugar.) 2 tablespoons hot water milk

Preparation

Put the instant coff ee, sugar, and hot water in a bowl. (Th e bigger the bowl, the more air will whip in, and the fl uffi er it will be.) Mix vigorously. (I used a hand whisk for 5 minutes.) Once the mixture is whipped, grab a glass and fi ll it half full (or more) with milk. (Th is is strong, I have to say, so if you’re not good with strong coff ee, add more milk.) Take the whipped coff ee mixture and put it on top of the milk and, voila, it’s done. Drink it up!

Prep and cooking time: 5–10 minutes. Diffi culty: Easy. *An article about dalgona can be found in the December 2017 issue of the Gwangju News: “Dalgona: An Entertaining, Wintery Snack from the Past.”

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▲ Capture from TV.

The Author

Viktoryia Shylkouskaya is a 26-year-old Belarusian currently residing in Gwangju. She moved to South Korea in 2016 without any knowledge of the country or language. What she thought would only be one year has since turned into many more. Instagram: @shylk.vick

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▼ Example for the recipe pictures composition.

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