I love Patbingsu!!! I don’t know if many like it because of the sweet red beans. You could say it is something that grows on you. You can find sweet red bean culture in East Asia: Korea, China and Japan. By the way, when red beans are cooked or eaten with other foods or ingredients, it can be a very nice dish or a desert! I would like to introduce it to one of them, Patbingsu. Today, some of my friends visited a bingsu place in Sihchon. I took a picture below while waiting since I thought they were so good looking and beautiful.
What is Bingsu?
Bingsu is a traditional icy desert. The most well-known and traditional one is Patbingsu, Sweet red bean Bingsu. Pat means red beans. Bing indicates ice. Su is water. It looks like this.
How Patbingsu began
Traditionally, you steam red beans which are known to drive away the heat in your body. And put salt in them so that they can become sweet. You crush ice and put the sweet red beans on top of the ice part along with pieces of rice cake and bean powder, which also become a garnish. You put some milk and milk dens then it becomes a perfect patbingsu. This is a summer desert.
Later Bingsu became ever better by replacing the typical ice with milk ice, which makes the flavor even better. The form also varied from Patbingsu. Today my friends and I ordered three kinds.