Korean Steamed Egg in volcano shape | One-pot 15 minutes recipe

This volcano-shape fluffy and steaming hot Korean steamed egg only takes 15 minutes to make.

Cooked and served in a Korean hot stone bowl, the one-pot comfort food can warm you up immediately on a cold day.

This dish could be extremely easy if you just want to enjoy some jiggly and savory steamed eggs. While there are many tricks for you to learn if you want to make your Korean steamed eggs grow into a volcano-like cone shape.

If you are looking for the steamed egg dish with jelly-like texture and a smooth surface, check out my Chinese steamed egg recipe by clicking the picture below. ⬇️

How to make Korean Steamed Egg in Volcano Shape 🌋

1. Use a Korean stone bowl or a saucepan

Traditional Korean steamed egg is cooked and served in a hot stone bowl, which is often used for making sizzling meals such as bibimbap, kimchi stew, and ginseng chicken soup.

Made from long-lasting earthenware and fine clay material, Korean stone bowl can be cooked directly on open fire, on electronic cooktop, or in an oven. As the hot stone bowl does not cool off as soon as removed from the stove, food continues to cook and arrives at the table sizzling hot.

To me, the best part of a Korean stone bowl is that it can always form a thin crust of slightly browned food at the bottom of the pot. For example, when we use it to cook rice, we will get scorched rice, also known as crunchy rice, at the bottom of the pot.

When we use a stone pot to cook Korean steamed eggs, the bottom layer of the eggs will turn golden brown with a special aroma, which we called “guo qi 锅气” (the breath of the pot) in Chinese. Guo qi is an unusual taste resulting form caramelization of food, or mallard effects at high cooking temperature that only stone pot or cast iron cookware can provide.

You can for sure make Korean steamed eggs with a saucepan. However, the most significant difference will be that, steamed eggs made in a saucepan won’t have that golden brown crust on the bottom, they won’t keep sizzling on your dinning table, and you won’t be able to taste the guo qi from this dish.

2. Amount of Eggs

Ideally you will need to fill the stone bowl (or the saucepan) about 85% full to create the tall volcano-shape steamed eggs.

My stone bowl was 16 oz (2 cup) size. If you are using a 24 oz stone bowl, you may have to use 7 eggs to reach this similar height. You’d better not eat so many eggs for one meal.

If you are just going to enjoy this dish by yourself, you don’t have to use so many eggs or make this volcano shape. The taste will be the same no matter how tall the eggs grow. 

3. Scrape the bottom and cover the top

There are two important steps to make the steamed eggs grow tall:

First, you need to continuously scrape the stone bowl from the side to the center. In this way, you can prevent the curds from burning at the bottom of the pot. At the same time, you can evenly distribute the curdled eggs and liquid eggs, so that the curds can support the liquid eggs to grow higher without deflating.

Second, once the the egg mixture is 75% solid 25% liquid, we will quickly cover the stone bowl with a dome shaped bowl to create a steamy environment. Make sure the bowl can cover the pot tightly, so that the hot steam can get into the eggs and expand them like a volcano.

4. Seasonings for Korean steamed egg

Traditional Korean steamed eggs are seasoned with salt, sesame oil and sesame seeds (for a nutty flavor and aroma), fish sauce and shrimp paste (for a rich savory seafood taste), green onions (for decoration and a fresh oniony smell).

Since it’s such a simple 15 minute home-cooking recipe, we should feel free to substitute the seasonings with any ingredients we like or have at home.

For example, you can substitute the sesame oil with vegetable oil if you’re allergic to sesame, and use soy sauce instead of fish sauce if you don’t want to buy a whole bottle of fish sauce just for this one dish.

I’d like some melted cheese over my jiggly steamed eggs, so I added a handful of shredded mozzarella cheese on the top, which has become my favorite part of this dish!

5. Messy cooktop

Some liquid will spill from the stone bowl as the eggs grow. You will be very likely to get a messy cooktop after cooking this dish.   

You may just use a larger pot or use fewer eggs to prevent the spill.

Actually, this kind of burnt egg mess can be cleaned up easily afterward. I usually clean my cooktop with this Weiman cooktop and stove top cleaner kit. This is not an ad. But this kit is really helpful and easy to use when I need to clean up my burned cooktop. 

INGREDIENTS List

These are ingredients for a 16oz pot. Multiply the ingredients with 1.5 if you are going to use a 24oz pot.

• 5 large eggs
• ¾ cup chicken stock (You can use vegetable stock, dashi stock, or water instead)
• ½ tsp salt
• ½ tsp sugar
• ¼ tsp shrimp paste (*See note 1)
• ¼ tsp sesame oil (Ideally use sesame oil, can be substituted with vegetable oil if you’re allergic to sesame.)
• ⅓ cup mozzarella cheese – shredded
• green onions 
• fresh peppers (For garnish. Can be skipped if you don’t like spicy food.)

Step-by-step INSTRUCTIONS 

1. Wash and chop some green onions and fresh peppers. Put them in a small bowl.

2. Crack 5 large eggs to a bowl, add salt, sugar, and shrimp paste to the eggs. Beat the eggs with a whisk until the yolk and white are combined. 

3. Add chicken stock or water to the egg mixture. Stir until well combined.

4. Brush sesame oil to a Korean stone bowl. Heat the stone bowl over medium heat until it about to smoke.

5. Pour the egg mixture into the stone bowl, use a spoon to scrap the stone bowl from the side to the center, so that you scrap up the curds.

6. About 7 minutes later, the egg mixture is 75% solid 25% liquid. Quickly add shredded mozzarella cheese, chopped green onions and fresh peppers on the top of the eggs.

7. Cover the stone bowl with a dome shaped bowl. Reduce the heat to medium low.

8. 3 minutes later, when you are able to see and hear steam escaping from the gap, turn off the heat and uncover the stone bowl.

9. Serve hot with steamed rice.

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