Just outside the automatic sliding doors of a bustling Los Angeles Koreatown market, a sweet aroma glazes the air. The sky is dark. Shoppers are anxious to get home.
But with rustling plastic grocery bags in hand, they stop and wait for one more moment.
In a shiny metal cart, a new batch of hotteok sizzles on the flat-top grill. Made with simple ingredients — rice flour, brown sugar, cinnamon and crushed peanuts, the warm concoction looks like a deep-fried pancake, but tastes rich and syrupy.
On school nights, from about 6:30 to 11 p.m., 22-year-old college student Catalina Pak relieves her uncle of his day shift and takes over. She stands behind a clear plastic window, underneath a white paper sign that reads “$1 each.” Customers often order by holding up their fingers.
“Three,” Catalina will say, turning to Elizabeth and Carmen, two Latino workers at the grill.
Catalina then grabs the ready-made hotteok with a pair of tongs, folds each one into a paper plate and smiles as she hands them over. Customers bite carefully into the piping hot snack, strolling back to their cars in the parking lot.
On cooler days, the little cart can sell up to 500 pancakes, with crowds of people lining up next to the coin-operated kiddie ride and rummaging through their purses and pockets for cash. Oftentimes, Catalina says, customers will buy one pancake before they enter the grocery store and then, as they exit, return for four more.
Catalina’s uncle Ki Hyon Nam has owned the cart for three years with his sister Ki Pak. Catalina says they got the recipe from a famous store in Korea. Traditional hotteok is sometimes stuffed with a sweet bean filling or fish paste.
During the day, Ki Hyon sits with a newspaper underneath the bright yellow awning decked with red and blue Korean characters. The cart’s English name is “Koo’s Grill,” referring to its original owner, but few still call it that.
Ki Hyon says the cart reminds people of Korea, where street vendors fire up large pots of oil and lure hungry folks in with the scents of yummy fried fare.
But his first memory of hotteok is at home.
“Sometimes, we need snack,” says Ki Hyon, 48. “My brother can cook this.”
When day turns to night, business bustles. People just getting off work are making their grocery stop before dinner. Dressed in aprons, the workers mix the ingredients, roll out balls of dough and put them on the grill. They then use a metal stamp-like tool to flatten them like pancakes and give them their brown and crispy exterior.
Next to a small tower of Styrofoam boxes for larger orders, Catalina leans against the counter, listening to the rumble of the fan. She says she doesn’t get paid, but that’s OK. Her parents pay her tuition.
