February 12th rings in the Year of the Ox across countries celebrating the Lunar New Year, including Korea. For Lunar New Year in Korea, Seollal, there is a full menu of delicious dishes to ring in a prosperous, healthy, and happy new year. One of the classic festive dishes to eat on Lunar New Year’s Day in Korea is Mandu-guk, Mandu dumplings (filled with meat and veggies or tofu) in beef or anchovy broth. It is also popular to have this dumpling-laden soup with rice cakes (ddukguk/tteok), when it is then called tteok-mandu-guk, and a ddukguk-only soup is also popular on Lunar New Year. You can make Mandu-guk with either store bought or home-made mandu dumplings (recipe for mandu from Maangchi). Check out these recipes for Mandu-guk from My Korean Kitchen, Maangchi and Korean Banpsang. Since it is going to be so cold here this weekend, we think that some hearty dumpling soup may just be what we need. Happy Lunar New Year!
Eating The World 