Today, I will make basic, but very delicious Korean vegetable pancakes, called YaChaeJeon (야채전) in Korean. I will also share some of my secrets about how to make the best pancakes. The many different kinds of vegetables, along with the crispy and chewy batter, makes for a great food. I am very glad to share this vegetarian friendly recipe with you today. Try it someday. 🙂
Yield: 6 Pancakes
Short Korean Lesson
- SiDa (시다) = Sour
- SseuDa (쓰다) = Bitter (Flavor)
Video Instructions
Main Ingredients
- 1½ Cups Potato
- 1 Cup Onion
- 1 Cup Zucchini
- ½ Cup Carrot
- ½ Cup Green Onion
- 2 Tbsp Red Hot Pepper (Optional)
- 1 tsp Salt
- Some Cooking Oil (For Frying)
Batter Ingredients
- 1 Cup All-Purpose Flour
- ½ Cup Korean Frying Mix
- 1 Cup Cold Water
- 2 Eggs
- ½ tsp Salt
Dipping Sauce Ingredients
- 1 Tbsp Soy Sauce
- ½ tsp Vinegar
- ½ tsp Water
Directions
Obtain the vegetables. Peel the skin and wash if needed. Depending on your tastes, you can use other vegetables.
Slice 2 red hot peppers thinly and julienne the rest of the vegetables: 1½ cups worth of potato, 1 cup worth of onion, 1 cup worth of zucchini, ½ cup worth of carrot, and ½ cup worth of green onion.
One of my secrets for delicious Korean pancakes is that I season the vegetables before mixing them into the batter. Gently mix all the vegetables, except the red hot peppers with 1 tsp of salt in a mixing bowl. Set it aside for about 3 minutes while making the pancake batter.
Mix all the ingredients for the batter: 1 cup all-purpose flour, ½ cup Korean frying mix, 1 cup cold water, 2 eggs, and ½ tsp salt. Using the Korean frying mix and using ice water are two more of my secrets for making crispy pancakes. If you do not have any frying mix, you can just use normal flour instead, but they will not be as crispy and tasty.
Mix the batter.
3 minutes later, the vegetables will be seasoned nicely with the salt. Add the salted vegetables into the batter.
Mix the vegetables with the batter gently. In this step, you can add the remaining red hot peppers. Alternatively, you can put each piece of hot pepper on top after you poured the batter into your pan.
Preheat a nonstick pan with a generous amount of oil on medium-high.
Pour some of the batter into the oiled pan.
Spread the batter out evenly and thinly with a fork. You can put some pieces of red hot pepper on top of the batter in this step for better color. Using a generous amount of oil, and making the pancakes thin, are two more secrets for crispy pancakes.
When one side of the pancake becomes golden brown, flip the pancake.
My last secret for this recipe is to occasionally push the pancake with your spatula to give it a better texture.
Cut your pancake into your desired shape. I like to slice mine like pizza. 🙂
Mix all the ingredients for the dipping sauce: 1 Tbsp soy sauce, ½ tsp vinegar, and ½ tsp water.
Serve the pancakes with the dipping sauce. If you keep the leftover pancakes in the refrigerator, you can reheat them in a toaster oven, on the stove, or in the microwave. Enjoy!
Tomorrow my son leaves for Seoul to orientation. He will teach English forone year but does not know where until they assign it to him. Yesterday he took ms out here for traditional food (Vancouver Canada). I love it, especially the pancakes. Guess this mothers heart will be sad with missing him but I’ll try to learn alongside with him from here, at least in the kitchen. Love your site and will look forward to trying recipes.
hi Trish,
Oh, your son went to Seoul safely? he is enjoying his experience over there so far? I hope everything is okay for him. 🙂 I can understand how much you will miss him. Thanks for your comment. Please come back and share more stories with me. 🙂
Hi, I love all of your recipes. But too bad I can’t find most of the korean ingredients like flour, paste , sauces etc in Malaysia and amazon.com doesn’t ship to my home. So, my suggestion is can you share more recipes without using those korean ingredients. Thank you 😀
hi zee,
I’m sorry that you can’t find Korean ingredients well over there. It is not easy for me to make something without Korean ingredients..but I will keep it in my mind and if I can come up with something, I will try to post them. Thanks for good advice. 🙂
Thanks Aeri. My how time flies, even when as a parent you think you will feel each minute your child is away….but life moves on and now it is even more exciting as we watch them grow.
I can totally agree with you. 🙂 I don’t know how long your son will stay there, but I hope he stays healthy, safe, and happy there. Thanks
Thanks Aeri. My son is stationed in Boryeong and teaches in two schools there. He has traveled to Seoul and to Busan on his weekends and seems to be adjusting well. I am learning to cook Sundubu jjigae and Korean pancakes and bibimbap and learning some basic Korean for my trip there in January. Love your site and am here to learn to make hobak juk for today. As I am on my own…these recipes usually last me a week but they are beyond good! I live in an isolated part of an island so have to read in advance of the ingredients I need so I can pick them up when I go into town for supplies. Thanks again for your recipes and hangul lessons.
Blessings!
Hi Trish,
It is nice to hear that your son is doing well in Korea. I can feel how much you miss and love your son through your comment. Wow that’s exciting that you will visit him in Korea soon. 😀 Thanks for sharing your experience about Korean cooking with me. love it.. ^^
Hi Aeri, does the potato requires soaking to prevent discolor as well as starch removal?
hi Nytcsh,
I don’t soak potato for my jeon.. what I do is.. I peel and cut the potato last after I do all other vegetables.. so you will not have to worry much about discoloring .. and potato starch gives good flavor and texture to the jeon.. so I want to keep it too. thanks ^^
What a great blog! Love your video, so helpful. 🙂 I’ll have to run across town to my favorite Asian market to look for the Korean Frying Mix. Haven’t heard of that before. one question: Do the shredded potatoes cook through I this short amount of time? These look so good, can’t wait to try them.
Yes, the potato is cut thinly, so it is cooked enough for the time. Try it someday. Thanks 🙂
Thank you so much for this recipe! My boyfriend and I recently moved to Korea to teach English for a short time and we really want to try as many Korean foods as possible. There’s a jeon restaurant not too far from our officetel but they are very spicy and mostly haemuljeon (which I am not too fond of), or very VERY spicy (which my boyfriend struggles with) so I wanted to make my own!
I tried a couple of recipes but the texture or flavour did not seem quite right. But the flavour with this recipe is so good and very filling, too! I usually still have half a bowl of batter left over so I can make more for breakfast in the morning 😀 The photos are very good and the way you wrote the recipe is very easy to understand and follow, unlike many recipes online. We make your jeon at least once a week, especially now it is raining a lot ^^; so I thought I would make sure to thank you 😀
hi Chelle,
How’s your life in Korea.. hope things are great over there. hehe.. I’m so happy you like my vegetable jeon recipe.. haha yes that’s what I usually do too.. save some batter and eat the next day. 🙂 Thank you very much for your comment.
This food is awesome I cooked it today for launch and my family really liked it…감사합니다 ^^
hi peony,
You are more than welcome. Thanks for trying my recipe. 🙂
Hello Aeri,
I wanted to thank you for all your recipes and your explanation! It’s just simple to follow the steps. I tried this korean pancakes and it was a real success ! My family liked it ! So thank you again !
See you soon for another try ! =)
hi Sarahime,
I’m very excited to hear your success. hehe.. thanks 🙂 Please come back with more successful stories. hehe