Buldak Fire Chicken With Rice Cakes

There are hundreds of weeknights in a year. That’s a lot of dinner! Test kitchen editor Kendra Vaculin is here to help. In her series Speedy Does It, she shares whoa-worthy meals you can get on the table like *snaps fingers* that.

Buldak, or fire chicken, is a spicy, saucy Korean dish that practically begs to be served with a cold beer. This one-skillet weeknight-friendly version swaps in simply marinated chicken breast pieces (no separate grilling required) that get stir-fried right alongside chewy, bouncy rice cakes before getting a blistered finish under the broiler. (You could also swap in boneless, skinless chicken thighs if you’d like.) The aromatic sauce gets its fiery goodness from a combination of gochujang and gochugaru; the paste adds spicy-sweet flavor and fermented depth, while the pepper flakes add earthy heat. For the savoriest chicken flavor, chicken stock is the way to go, but if your cabinet is out, vegetable broth or water work as well. Don’t be tempted to use fancy fresh mozzarella cheese here—cheese buldak relies on a blanket of the super-melty, low-moisture variety, like Polly-O. And don’t skip the pop of scallions (a.k.a. green onions) on top.