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Good Alley Legacy · Braised Spicy Ribs

Dongin-dong Jjimgalbi

Dongin-dong Jjimgalbi — street food from Daegu, South Korea
📷 Closely related photo — Photo: Junho Jung / Wikimedia Commons · CC BY-SA 3.0

The extra-fiery version is said to have been invented almost by accident in the early 1970s, when a restaurant owner served it simply as a spicy snack to go with makgeolli.

Beef short ribs are braised low with a heavy dose of red chili powder and garlic instead of the usual soy-sauce base, turning the dish fiery red rather than dark brown, and served bubbling in a big communal pan. A single residential alley in Daegu's Dongin-dong has built its whole identity around the dish since the 1960s and 70s.

Why it's made this way: Dongin-dong's cluster of jjimgalbi restaurants grew organically through the 1960s and 70s into one of the city's best-known 'restaurant alleys,' and the extra-spicy, garlic-heavy style remains distinct from the milder soy-based galbijjim found elsewhere in Korea.
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Part of World of Street Food — 3248 dishes from 118 countries. Something wrong here? Tell us in the comments below. Photo credits.