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Vegetables from Hwanghae Province

Hobakji (pumpkin kimchi of Hwanghae and Chungcheong)호박지

Hobakji is kimchi made with pumpkin that is cooked into a stew rather than eaten raw. In the Hwanghae summer form, thick slices of medium-ripe pumpkin and young radish are salted, covered with a boiled flour-and-brine liquid and ripened for about five or six days until yellow. The winter form uses old pumpkin with the radish, cabbage and jeot left over from kimjang.

Fully documentedVegetables5 days – 6 days

Recipe

No fixed amounts recordedHousehold recipe with no fixed amounts.
Pumpkin, neither old nor very youngWashed and cut into thick half-moons (summer form)[ekc-hobak]
Young radish (yeolmu), neither too tender nor too toughTrimmed and washed[ekc-hobak]
SaltFor salting the pumpkin and radish in layers; the brine is kept[ekc-hobak]
Wheat flourStirred into the leftover brine and boiled[ekc-hobak]
Old cheongdung pumpkin, radish or cabbage, chilli powder, green onion, garlic, ginger and jeotThe winter form, made at kimjang with leftover vegetables and any leftover jeot[ekc-hobakji-jjigae]
StarterKimchi in general is fermented in an unsterilised natural environment, where the microbes already present grow [kim2021].

Total time across the recorded steps: 5 days – 6 days

Start
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What changes: A medium-ripe pumpkin is cut into thick half-moons and young radish is trimmed

Step 1 of 5
Cut the pumpkin and trim the young radish
Time
Not documented
Temperature
Not documented
Salt
None given
Acidity
Not documented
Which microbes the steps name, step by step
Weissella cibaria
Latilactobacillus sakei
L. plantarum
L. mesenteroides
Flavour
Not documented
Texture
Not documented
Colour
Not documented

Microbes at work in this step

Not documented for this step.

Method

Measured measured in a studySet fixed by a specification or tested recipeReported one source reports itTypical a general value, not sourced for this fermentUnconfirmed not yet checked against a source

At a glance

Hobakji is kimchi made with pumpkin that is cooked into a stew rather than eaten raw. In the Hwanghae summer form, thick slices of medium-ripe pumpkin and young radish are salted, covered with a boiled flour-and-brine liquid and ripened for about five or six days until yellow. The winter form uses old pumpkin with the radish, cabbage and jeot left over from kimjang. Made in 5 steps over 5 days – 6 days. The longest step, ripen until yellow, takes 5–6 days (Encyclopedia of Korean Culture (한국민족문화대백과사전)…). Weissella cibaria, Latilactobacillus sakei, Lactiplantibacillus plantarum, Leuconostoc mesenteroides and Levilactobacillus brevis, the most dominant species in a related ferment, Chinese-cabbage kimchi does most of the fermenting.

Key numbers
Main step5–6 daysReported[ekc-hobak]Ripen until yellow

What makes this one different

Hobakji is made to be cooked. The summer form is ripened under a boiled flour brine for under a week, and the winter form uses leftover kimjang vegetables and jeot and cannot be eaten raw.

Related ferments

Variants

  • Winter hobakji (old pumpkin)Old cheongdung pumpkin cut lengthwise into eight, seeded, peeled and sliced, with salted radish or cabbage and chilli, jeot and spices; stewed with rice-washing water in a ttukbaegi.
  • Hwanghae summer squash and young radish kimchiGreen squash and young radish, cooked with meat or clams and seasoned with doenjang.

Safety

The encyclopedia advises making hobakji a little at a time, because a large batch kept long turns mushy and poor. The winter form is not eaten raw but boiled in rice-washing water.

History and sources

Every number is labelled with how it is known. How this atlas is made

History
The sources we found do not record its history.
Temperature, salt and pH
The sources we found give no temperature, salt or pH figure for any of its steps.
  1. [ekc-hobak] Encyclopedia of Korean Culture (한국민족문화대백과사전), 호박김치, written by Jeong Sun-ja 1995, revised 2023; public work under KOGLbook
  2. [ekc-hobakji-jjigae] Encyclopedia of Korean Culture (한국민족문화대백과사전), 호박지찌개, written by Hwang Hye-seong 1995, revised 2023; public work under KOGLbook
  3. [nfm-kimchi] National Folk Museum of Korea, Encyclopedia of Korean Folk Culture, Korean Food, Clothing and Housing (한국의식주생활사전), 김치 (regional kimchi; hobak kimchi among the well-known Chungcheong kimchi) and 호박; KOGL type 2, facts only; read 2026-10book
  4. [kim2021] Kim E., Yang S.-M., Kim H.-Y. 2021, Analysis of cultivable microbial community during kimchi fermentation using MALDI-TOF MS, Foods 10(5):1068, doi:10.3390/foods10051068paper
  5. [s2] Korean Wikipedia, 김치 (Hwanghae regional list; 호박김치 definition)wiki