Chuseok, one of the four major holidays in Korea. There are people who help make Chuseok, a day to celebrate the end of the year’s farming and to celebrate abundance, a little more comfortable. There is a store that sells Jeon, the representative food of the holiday, at a low price, a place that makes traditional Korean sweets using gravel, and a rice cake shop run by three brothers who inherited their father’s business. We meet people who are trying to make Chuseok, the biggest holiday, easier for busy modern people.
‘Extreme Job’ Chuseok! The episode about people in charge of the holiday will air on EBS1TV at 8:55 PM on Saturday, September 14th.
A fight in front of a hot fire! A representative holiday food, Jeon
When it comes to holidays, the first food that comes to mind is Jeon. This is because it is one of the foods that must be served on the ancestral rite table. A Jeon restaurant in a market in Incheon Metropolitan City. The day here starts at 5:30 in the morning. This is because many customers who leave work early or go hiking come to visit. They start early and make 16 different types of Jeon a day, and the amount is a whopping 1,000 sheets! They even use about 30 plates of eggs. When you wrestle with Jeon in front of a hot fire all day, it is common for oil to splatter here and there on your arms. They say that the heat rises to the point of dizziness or headaches. Despite this, the owner always has a smile on his face and is simply happy as long as the customers enjoy the food.
Let’s take a look at a long-standing collection of works that were inherited from mothers and will now be passed on to their children.
The taste and style of our tradition, Jagal Hangwa
A village in Hapcheon, Gyeongsangnam-do. The grandmothers here are so busy that they don’t even have time to breathe during the holidays. The reason is that they make hangwa, which is an essential item during the holidays. They only work for three months a year, one month for Chuseok and two months for Seollal. The hangwa of this village is not the fried hangwa that you know of. It is the very same gravel hangwa that was made in the past when oil was scarce, by gathering pebbles, heating them, and baking them. Starting with the glutinous rice dough, baking the hangwa on the pebbles, and then coating them with homemade syrup and wrapping them… They do all the work, so they never have time to rest. Furthermore, they say that it is so hot that they can hardly breathe because they keep baking the hangwa on the pebbles that are 170℃ hot. Nevertheless, the grandmothers, who are bound by a strong bond, always care for and protect each other and happily make hangwa…
Let’s meet the grandmothers who make traditional Korean sweets in an unparalleled way.
The irreplaceable star of Chuseok, rice cake
It is said that our ancestors have made and eaten rice cakes during Chuseok since long ago. This custom has continued to this day, and songpyeon has become the traditional food of Chuseok. In the past, it was common for each household to make and eat songpyeon, but now the trend has changed to buying them… because making songpyeon is no easy task. That is why rice cake shops become busy during Chuseok. A rice cake factory in Gyeonggi-do is said to produce 400,000 songpyeon during Chuseok. They make songpyeon using a machine, cool it quickly, and then move it to a rice cake steaming factory, where they steam and sell the songpyeon as soon as orders come in. Meanwhile, this place makes various rice cakes in addition to songpyeon, one of which is yaksik. Yaksik involves mixing rice and sauce by hand, and manually inserting chestnuts into the rice cake. This is a cumbersome process that must be done because it makes delicious rice cakes.
We introduce the site where they do their best to make the best rice cake.
Reporter Park Yu-mi Photo EBS Extreme Job
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2024-09-14 11:21:40