What is "bugak"

Bugak is a variety of twigim , or fried Korean traditional dishes, made by deep frying dried vegetables or seaweed that have been coated with chapssalpul (찹쌀풀, glutinous rice paste) for preservation. The culinary technique is rare along with twigak (튀각, deep fried vegetables without coating) in Korean cuisine, all of which are regarded as specialty of Korean Buddhist cuisine.

The ingredients for making bugak are kombu, gim (Korean laver), perilla leaves, chili pepper leaves, ueong (우엉, greater burdock leaves), shoots of Ailanthus altissima, camellia leaves, chrysanthemum leaves, sliced potato and so forth.

Vegetable oils such as perilla oil or soybean oil are used for frying.