Damyang Tteokgalbi and Daetongbap: The Bamboo Town's Signature Meal

In Damyang you will often be served tteokgalbi, minced rib meat pressed back onto the bone and grilled, alongside daetongbap, rice steamed in a bamboo tube. Here are the competing origin stories, how it differs from Gwangju's Songjeong style and how to eat the bamboo rice.

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Eating in Bamboo Country

Damyang in South Jeolla Province is Korea's bamboo town. Famous for groves such as Juknokwon, it puts bamboo on the table as well. Bamboo shoots come up from spring into early summer, so side dishes like seasoned shoots, shoot and soybean-paste soup and pickled shoots are everywhere. Liquor aged inside bamboo tubes is another local specialty. The combination travelers seek out most is tteokgalbi with daetongbap. Order a tteokgalbi set and many places bring daetongbap and a spread of southern-style side dishes with it, so one table gives you a good sampling of the town.

The Name and Its Many Origin Stories

Tteokgalbi is rib meat chopped fine, seasoned, shaped into a flat patty and grilled. The name is usually explained by its resemblance to tteok, Korean rice cake. It was once also called hyo-galbi, "filial ribs," because it was made for older people with weak teeth, and many accounts say the name tteokgalbi only became common in the late 1960s or early 1970s. Damyang has its own story: the early Joseon scholar-official Song Hui-gyeong (1376-1446), who served as an envoy to Japan, settled in Damyang and brought dishes he had tasted at court. The tale appears in many introductions to the dish, but it is not confirmed by historical records. The idea that tteokgalbi was a royal dish has also been questioned as a story that spread from the late 1990s.

Damyang Style vs. Gwangju's Songjeong Style

Jeolla-style tteokgalbi is usually discussed in two branches. Gwangju's Songjeong tteokgalbi, from the neighboring city, is said to have started in Songjeong-ri in the 1950s; it mixes beef and pork half and half and marinates the meat at length in a sauce of some 20 ingredients before grilling it slowly. Damyang style uses beef short rib. The meat is cut off the bone, chopped fine and mixed with a marinade of soy sauce, sesame oil, garlic, scallion, pear juice and the like, then pressed back onto the rib bone and shaped into a neat rectangle. It is grilled on a rack over oak charcoal and basted with more sauce as it cooks. Building the patty on the bone, unlike Songjeong style, is the commonly cited difference, and it means you can pick it up by the bone.

Daetongbap: Rice Steamed in Bamboo

Daetongbap is rice steamed in a tube cut from a thick bamboo stalk at the joint, together with mixed grains, chestnuts, jujubes, ginkgo nuts, pine nuts and similar ingredients. The tube is about 10 cm across, and its opening is covered with hanji paper while it steams. It is also called juktongbap. The appeal is the faint bamboo aroma that seeps into the rice as it cooks. Daetongbap is a fairly recent dish: one account says it took hold after Damyang's bamboo-craft industry declined sharply in the 1980s and people looked for new uses for bamboo. Today it is always named alongside tteokgalbi as one of the town's signature foods. Restaurants vary the share of glutinous rice and the grains they add, so each place's version tastes a little different.

How to Eat It and Where to Go

Eat tteokgalbi as soon as it arrives from the grill. If it is still on the bone, ask staff to cut it with scissors or simply pick it up by the bone. Wrapping it in leafy greens or eating it with bamboo-shoot side dishes cuts the richness. You can scoop daetongbap straight from the tube, but many people top it with bamboo-shoot or mountain greens, add gochujang and mix it like a rice bowl. It is commonly served with vinegared bamboo shoots and soybean-paste soup. Most restaurants serving tteokgalbi and daetongbap are in central Damyang-eup, so they fit neatly into a walk through Juknokwon's bamboo grove or along the Gwanbangjerim forest. Most dishes are ordered per person, and whether daetongbap comes with the tteokgalbi set varies, so check when you order. In spring, be sure to try the bamboo-shoot dishes too.

#Damyang tteokgalbi#Daetongbap#Bamboo rice#Damyang#Jeollanam-do food