Koryo-saram cuisine

Koryo-saram are ethnic Koreans from the former Soviet Union, and their cuisine is a unique offshoot of Korean cooking shaped by the various countries they’ve lived in. This food tradition is separate from that of Sakhalin Koreans, another Korean community in the former Soviet Union with its own culinary identity. While dishes like morkovcha have become a common sight in grocery stores across the former Soviet Union, the cuisine remains almost entirely unknown in South Korea—a fact that sometimes surprises visitors from Russia.

The cuisine is most closely tied to the cooking of the Hamgyong provinces, now in North Korea, since many Koryo-saram trace their roots there. Many dishes are adaptations of Korean recipes using locally available ingredients. For instance, pork is common in Korea but scarce in Koryo-saram cuisine in Uzbekistan due to Islamic dietary restrictions. Seafood, also popular in Korea, is absent among inland Koryo-saram. The food was further adjusted for non-Korean customers, often by using less pepper.

Koryo-saram also eat typical foods from their current regions. Many Korean Ukrainians who move to South Korea for work miss Ukrainian food and prefer their own dishes over South Korean ones. A restaurant like Cafe Lily in New York City, run by Uzbeki Koreans, serves Central Asian food alongside Koryo-saram cuisine. The cuisine is so different from South Korean food—partly because it comes from areas now in North Korea—that some Koryo-saram, such as academic German Kim, find many South Korean dishes unfamiliar or even unpleasant. Some Russians are reportedly taken aback when they visit South Korea and discover morkovcha is virtually unheard of there.

Koryo-saram have also woven Korean spices into other dishes, and several of their creations have become widely popular across the former Soviet Union. Morkovcha, for example, is sold pre-made in many grocery stores.