On a rainy Saturday last month, I sat down in a salon chair and made peace with the fact that I’d be there some six-plus hours. Such is the reality of a brunette desperate to have a bit of blonde fun.
Finally, it was time for the blowout. I always ask for big, voluminous hair, yet it never comes out quite how I like. My stylist and I talked at length about exactly what I was going for. It wasn’t just body; it was bounce. I wanted hair with some spring to it, with verve, with texture, with a little reverb. I wanted hair like a Korean rice cake.
Allow me to stretch for that reach: Korean rice cakes (tteok) are the pinnacle of bounce, with a chewiness that only briefly resists you before it graciously gives.
In the kitchen, it doesn’t get much bouncier or springier than Eleanore Park’s new recipe for miso rice cakes with spinach and peas, with its chewy tteok and abundance of quick-cooking, in-season produce. It is vitality in a skillet. “This is my new favorite recipe,” wrote a reader. “The flavor is so balanced and multidimensional: the sweetness of the peas, the umami of the miso and soy, the bright fresh flavors of the herbs.”
Miso Rice Cakes With Spinach and Peas
Hetty Lui McKinnon uses the tubular type in her rice cakes with peanut sauce and hoisin. Her recipe is reminiscent of another bouncy wonder: fried cheung fun, the dim sum classic of steamed rice noodle rolls. Here, you get two textures for the price of one. The rice cakes are stir-fried for a slightly crisp exterior, but their plush interior remains.
Made with glutinous rice flour, either type of tteok can be found in vacuum-sealed packages or frozen at Asian grocers or well-stocked markets, and keeps especially well.
Thinner than rice cakes, but no less bouncy, udon noodles can add that coveted texture to stir-fries and soups thanks to their high gluten content. Ali Slagle’s sesame-brown butter udon noodles are incredibly versatile and a breeze to pull off. Sub arugula or another leafy green for the spinach; add edamame or (bouncy!) firm tofu for protein; swap the soy sauce out for another source of umami, like Parm, miso or seaweed.
Pillowy gnocchi offer a lighter, slightly more tender bounce, and are just as worth keeping on hand in the freezer or pantry. In her recipe for skillet gnocchi with miso butter and asparagus, Ali applies a strategy similar to Eleanore’s, embellishing her choice of chewy with a silky, savory sauce and plenty of springtime vegetables.
But you could take things in a heftier direction, should your day or mood require it. Yossy Arefi’s one-pan cheesy baked gnocchi with spicy tomato sauce awaits, the gooey mozzarella and acidic tomatoes underscoring the soft nature of the potato dumplings.
And for dessert, Eleanore’s back on the bouncy beat, this time adapting a recipe for Jessica Wang’s mochi cake. Her lemon-honey nian gao is gluten-free thanks to the presence of mochiko, sweet rice flour, which is responsible for this light cake’s signature elasticity. Shingled lemon slices macerated in honey add golden highlights. Bouncy, blonde and beautiful in far less than six hours.
Sesame-Brown Butter Udon Noodles
Cheesy Baked Gnocchi With Spicy Tomato Sauce
Lemon-Honey Nian Gao (Mochi Cake)
One More Thing!
Last week, I gave you a jar’s worth of pickle-laden recipes. And then I got this reader email: “Loved the recipes using pickles, but did you forget the most important thing? We need a recipe for crunchy homemade pickles to top it all off, don’t we?”
Doy. Sohla El-Waylly has you covered with quick dill pickles, and Melissa Clark’s got your bread-and-butter chips. And while I’m at it, why not pickle some zucchini or red onions?
Thanks for reading, and see you next week!
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Tanya Sichynsky is an editor for the Food and Cooking sections of The Times and the author of The Veggie, a weekly vegetarian newsletter.
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