Guk

Guk

Soegogimuguk (beef and radish soup)
Alternative names	Tang
Type	Soup
Place of origin	Korea

Guk (국, Korean pronunciation: [kuk]), also sometimes known as Tang (탕, Korean pronunciation: [tʰaŋ]), is a class of soup-like dishes in Korean cuisine. Guk and tang are commonly grouped together and regarded as the same type of dish, although guk is more watery and a basic dish for the Korean table setting, and is usually eaten at home; tang has less water than guk and has been developed for sale in restaurants.

Guk is a native Korean word, while tang is a Sino-Korean word that originally meant "boiling". Tang has been used as an honorific term in place of guk. Tang can denote the same meaning as guk in the names of dishes such as mae-untang (spicy seafood soup), daegutang (codfish soup), samgyetang (ginseng chicken soup), or chueotang (추어탕).

Generally, the names of soups made with vegetables are suffixed with guk rather than tang. Toranguk (taro soup), kimchiguk (kimchi soup), muguk (radish soup), siraegiguk (soup made with napa cabbage), and miyeok guk (sea mustard soup) are some examples. Gamjaguk and gamjatang are made with different ingredients; gamjaguk is made largely with potatoes, but gamjatang is made with pork bones and few potatoes.

Guk is largely categorized into four groups of soups, such as malgeun jangguk (맑은 장국), gomguk (곰국), tojangguk (토장국), and naengguk (냉국). Malgeun jangguk literally means "clear (malgeun, 맑은) soup (guk, 국) seasoned with a condiment (jang, 장)," such as doenjang (soy bean paste) or ganjang, and is served in a bansang (반상, regular meal table). The main ingredients for malgeun jangguk are meat, fish, vegetables, and seafoods. Gomguk, also called gomtang, refers to either a soup type made by boiling various beef parts such as rib, oxtail, brisket, head, and so forth for a long time, or made with ox bone by the same method. The broth of gomguk tends to have a milky color and to be rich and hearty taste. It can also be made with chicken or pork bone, to produce samgyetang or gamjatang.