Hoe-deopbap회덮밥

No record pins down when hoe-deopbap (회덮밥) first appeared, but the raw-fish culture behind it is old. Siuijeonseo, a cookbook from the late 1800s, serves sliced croaker with mustard and dresses raw clams and oysters with vinegared soy sauce stirred with chili powder. A later cookbook, Joseon Yori Jebeop, likewise says to slice seasonal fish thinly and dip it in mustard or chogochujang, the tangy vinegared chili paste. Before chili peppers spread widely, doenjang or mustard sauces were the usual dips; today chogochujang is raw fish's constant companion.

Despite the word deopbap ("rice with a topping") in its name, the dish is eaten by mixing the fish, vegetables and chogochujang into the rice, so in practice it is closer to bibimbap. Coastal towns have long made their own raw-fish dishes from the local catch. In the Gangneung area of Gangwon Province, hoe-deopbap is part of a local repertoire that includes mulhoe (cold raw-fish soup) and spicy raw-fish salad, and one well-known version uses flounder sliced bones and all, tossed with vegetables and chogochujang and mixed into rice.