Beef-Stuffed Potato Pancakes

Yukjeon Sogogijeon Beef Pancakes are pieces of thinly sliced beef that are dipped in flour and egg, and then pan-fried until golden-yellow and crispy.

These Korean yukjeon are served with a sweet, spicy and umami ssamjang dip, and a tiny piece of crunchy onion for a bold and flavorful bite.

I was inspired to make this ssamjang-esque dip after seeing Ben Deen’s Korean Beef Pancake mukbang on YouTube. But his dipping sauce does look spicer. Alternatively, you can eat these beef sogogijeon with a classic jeon dipping sauce, made from soy sauce, apple cider vinegar and sugar.

If you like Korean jeon, you might also enjoy these recipes: Shrimp Pancake Saeu Jeon, Baechu Jeon Cabbage Pancakes, and Gaji Jeon Eggplant Pancakes. These recipes are all made using the same method as Korean beef yuk jeon.

In this recipe, I am happy to feature a local dish from South Bohemia called “Cmunda po Kaplicku”. The dish consists of a folded, garlic-scented potato pancake with smoked meat and sauerkraut nestled inside.

We Czechs love fried potato pancakes (bramboraky) with the rich taste of garlic and dried marjoram. In the second half of the 20th century, a wise cook invented a dish that combines potato pancakes with other typical Czech delicacies: smoked meat and sauerkraut.

It happened in the town of Kaplice in southern Bohemia, where the dish got its name: Cmunda po Kaplicku. So that you know, cmunda is one of the many beautiful Czech words used for potato pancakes!

The dish is served as satisfying comfort food and is best accompanied by a chilled Pilsner-style beer.

Try out this chicken stuffed potato pancake, a Czech dish called “Rizek Ondras”!

Draniki is a common food in Eastern European cuisine. Essentially, these are potato pancakes that can be either cooked alone and served alongside sour cream, or filled with meat, mushrooms, or other vegetables. This version of draniki is filled with ground beef, which makes it especially filling and suitable for any time of the day.

Ingredients for Beef-Stuffed Potato Pancakes:

Method of preparing the Beef-Stuffed Potato Pancakes:

In a large bowl, grate the potatoes on a box grater or food processor. The resulting potato puree should have the consistency of applesauce. Set aside for a few minutes and strain.
Grate the onion into a separate small bowl. Transfer the grated onion to the bowl with the potatoes, reserving 1 tbsp for the meat filling.
To the potato bowl, add the egg, sour cream, flour, 1 tsp of salt, and a pinch of ground black pepper. Stir until even.
In a separate bowl, combine the ground beef, remaining tbsp of grated onion, salt, and pepper. Shape into 16 thin beef patties and set them out on a cutting board.
Heat cooking oil in a large skillet on medium heat.
Spoon 1 scoop of the potato mixture into the hot skillet, flatten it out thin. Top the potato pancake with one beef patty and cover it with another scoop of potato mix. Repeat for the rest of the patties.
When the edges of the potato pancakes turn golden brown, flip the pancake with a spatula, and continue cooking on the other side until cooked through and golden brown. This will take around 4 minutes on each side.
Transfer the ready potato pancakes to a plate lined with paper towels. Serve the potato pancakes fresh with sour cream on the side.

Natashaskitchen. com

Prep: 45 min. + standing Cook: 40 min.

This is a favorite in our household, and it’s perfect for using up leftover roast beef. The green onion cake dough is easy to make and cooks quickly. Then just reheat the sliced beef in a frying pan with a sweet and savory sauce. —Carla Mendres, Winnipeg, Manitoba

Ingredients

2-1/2 cups all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon salt
1 cup boiling water
1 bunch green onions, finely chopped
1/2 cup canola oil
1 tablespoon sesame oil
1 small onion, thinly sliced
2 garlic cloves, minced
1 teaspoon minced fresh gingerroot
1 package (15 ounces) refrigerated beef roast au jus, drained and chopped or 2 cups chopped cooked roast beef
3 tablespoons soy sauce
2 tablespoons hoisin sauce
1 tablespoon honey

Directions

Place flour and salt in a large bowl; stir in boiling water until dough forms a ball. Turn onto a floured surface; knead until smooth and elastic, 4-6 minutes. Place in a large bowl; cover and let rest for 30 minutes.
Divide dough into 8 portions; roll each portion into an 8-in. circle. Sprinkle each with 1 tablespoon green onion. Roll up jelly-roll style; holding 1 end of the rope, wrap dough around, forming a coil, pinching to seal. Flatten slightly. Roll each coil to 1/8-in. thickness.
In a large cast-iron or other heavy skillet, heat 1 tablespoon canola oil. Cook pancakes, 1 at a time, over medium-high heat until golden brown, 2-3 minutes on each side, adding more oil as needed; keep warm.

Nutrition Facts

1 roll: 390 calories, 20g fat (3g saturated fat), 32mg cholesterol, 898mg sodium, 37g carbohydrate (5g sugars, 2g fiber), 16g protein.

Ingredients for Mexican style pancakes.

240 g all-purpose flour
300 ml water
300 ml milk
1/2 teaspoon of salt
1 egg “L”
1 teaspoon of sugar
oil for frying

400 g minced beef
150 g onion
2 big cloves of garlic
240 g canned red beans (can 400 g)
285 g canned sweetcorn (can 340 g)
2 tablespoons of oil
450 g tomatoes
50 g cheese
1 teaspoon of sweet paprika powder
1 teaspoon of oregano
1 and 1/2 teaspoon of salt
1/2 teaspoon of pepper
1 teaspoon of chopped chili
100 ml water

450 g tomato sauce
100 g cheese
1 teaspoon of oregano
1/2 teaspoon of salt
a small bunch of coriander
lime and sour cream for serving

How to make Mexican style pancakes.

Pour milk and water into a bowl, add egg, sugar, salt and sifted flour. Whisk for about a minute or until there are no lumps in the batter. When mixed, set it aside for 10 minutes.

Put the frying pan on the heat, warm it up and when it’s hot, brush it with a little oil. Using a ladle, thinly pour the pancake batter. Fry the pancakes over a medium heat until golden brown on both sides.

Stuffing – preparation.

Put the finely chopped onion and oil in a large frying pan and fry for 3-4 minutes over medium heat. Add mashed garlic and finely chopped chili to it. After a minute of frying, add the minced meat, oregano, sweet ground paprika and diced tomatoes. Continue frying for 10 minutes, then add the corn, beans, salt, pepper and water. Cover the frying pan with a lid and simmer for 30 minutes, stirring occasionally. Remove the cooked stuffing from heat, add cheese, mix and cool it down.

Preparation of tomato sauce.

Pour tomato sauce, oregano and salt into a pot. Bring it to a boil.

Assembling Mexican style pancakes.

Place the fried pancakes on the kitchen counter, fill each with cold stuffing and roll it up.

Brush the heat-resistant baking dish with a little tomato sauce, place the filled pancakes in next to one another, pour the tomato sauce over them and sprinkle on the top with cheese. Next, cover the dish with aluminium foil or a lid and place it in an oven preheated to 180 degrees Celsius for 30 minutes.

Serve Mexican style pancakes with a dash sour cream, sprinkled with chopped coriander and drizzled with a little lime juice.

Good to know when making Mexican style pancakes.

I fried the pancakes in a 24 cm wide pan. In total I got 9 pancakes.

You can replace the coriander with parsley or fresh herbs such as oregano, basil or chives.

I bake my pancakes in two medium-sized baking dishes. When filled with stuffing and rolled up, the pancakes are quite large, therefore they need some space in the baking dish. Do not put them on top of each other, they should lie next to each other.

The pancakes can be served with guacamole.

Do you like pancakes? If so, try our recipe for Banana flour pancakes with strawberries.

➜ Useful tips

The warm potato pancake has crispy edges. Once it cools, the pancake softens, but it’s still good if you eat it just like that on its own.
A potato pancake stuffed with smoked meat and sauerkraut is a filling and nutritionally rich meal. For better digestion, Czechs always drink lager or a cold Pilsner with fried dishes.

More potato recipes

Leave a review down in the comments! ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐

Potato pancakes

(680 g) Yukon gold or Russets
(80 ml) hot
or sunflower/rapeseed oil, to fry pancakes

First, make a batter for potato pancakes. Peel the potatoes and shred them finely. Squeeze out excess water. Put the potato shreds in a large bowl and pour the hot milk over them. Add peeled and pressed garlic, eggs, salt, dried marjoram, ground pepper, and flour. Stir until combined and a semi-fluid batter forms.
Heat the slices of smoked meat. Heat half a tablespoon of lard or fat in a frying pan over medium-high heat, and fry the meat briefly on both sides. Reduce the heat to one-third, add four tablespoons of water, and let the meat heat through for another five minutes. Halfway through, flip the meat. Put the meat aside and keep it warm, like potato pancakes. Do not pour off any liquid left in the pan after heating the meat!
Drain the sauerkraut and, if necessary, cut it into shorter strips. Put it in the same pan in which you previously heated the meat. Heat the sauerkraut over medium-high heat for three to five minutes. Stir occasionally. Season sauerkraut to taste. If it is too sour, add a teaspoon of sugar.
Time to put together the final dish! Place a potato pancake on the plate. Put the warmed, smoked meat on the right half and top with sauerkraut. Finally, fold the potato pancake, so the meat and sauerkraut peek out a little.

Makes 3 filled potato pancakes.
Serve Kaplice cmunda warm as a hearty lunch or dinner. To lighten up the meal, put fresh veggies or a homemade vegetable salad alongside the stuffed potato pancake.
The warm potato pancake has crispy edges. Once it cools, the pancake softens, but it’s still good if you eat it just like that on its own.

DISCLAIMER: Because I come from Central Europe, my recipes are based on metric units such as grams or milliliters. Check out how I convert metric units to the U.S. system:

Yukjeon Sogogijeon Beef Pancakes

Yukjeon Sogogijeon Beef Pancakes are thin pieces of beef, coated in flour & egg, and pan-fried until golden.

Appetizer, Dinner, Lunch, Main Course

beef, thinly sliced (225g) (I used a sirloin cut roasting joint)
¼ cup (4 tbsp) all-purpose flour (35g)

Optional

green onion, chopped
garlic clove, minced
toasted sesame oil

Jeon Dipping Sauce (Option 2)

apple cider vinegar
sugar (Muscovado sugar)
green onion, chopped
toasted sesame seeds

Instructions

Prepare your dipping sauce of choice (see above). Dice onion into chunky pieces. Set aside.
Thinly slice 0.5lb beef into bite-sized pieces. This process is easier if the beef has been frozen for several hours beforehand.
One-by-one, dredge both sides of the beef pieces in ¼ cup all-purpose flour (on a plate).
Crack two eggs in a large bowl. Season with salt and pepper and beat well. One-by one, dip the beef slices in beaten egg- making sure to fully coat each piece in egg.
Pour 3-4 tbsp oil into a large non-stick pan. Heat on medium/medium-high heat. Pinch a slice of beef between two fingers and swish it in egg mixture to coat in egg again. Place in pan and repeat until the pan is full.
Cook the yukjeon for several minutes on each side, until golden and crispy. Wipe the pan with a paper towel before adding oil and pan-frying the second batch of yukjeon.
Serve with dipping sauce, and ssam lettuce wraps with rice, if you prefer.

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➜ Instructions with photos

STEP 1: First, make a batter for potato pancakes.

Peel the potatoes and shred them finely. Squeeze out excess water.

TIP: Learn how to shred potatoes in my detailed article!

Put the potato shreds in a large bowl and pour the hot milk over them. Add peeled and pressed garlic, eggs, salt, dried marjoram, ground pepper, and flour. Stir until combined and a semi-fluid batter forms.

STEP 2: In a non-stick frying pan about 10 inches (25 cm) in diameter, heat a tablespoon of lard or fat over medium-high heat. Scoop the potato dough with a ladle, pour it into the pan, and spread it in a thin layer.

Fry each side until golden brown; it takes about two minutes to fry each side of the pancake.

Transfer the fried potato pancakes to a plate lined with paper towels to drain the excess fat. Keep the pancakes warm.

STEP 3: Heat the slices of smoked meat. Heat half a tablespoon of lard or fat in a frying pan over medium-high heat, and fry the meat briefly on both sides. Reduce the heat to one-third, add four tablespoons of water, and let the meat heat through for another five minutes. Halfway through, flip the meat.

Put the meat aside and keep it warm, like potato pancakes.

Do not pour off any liquid left in the pan after heating the meat!

STEP 4: Drain the sauerkraut and, if necessary, cut it into shorter strips. Put it in the same pan in which you previously heated the meat.

Heat the sauerkraut over medium-high heat for three to five minutes. Stir occasionally. Season sauerkraut to taste. If it is too sour, add a teaspoon of sugar.

STEP 5: Time to put together the final dish!

Place a potato pancake on the plate. Put the warmed, smoked meat on the right half and top with sauerkraut. Finally, fold the potato pancake, so the meat and sauerkraut peek out a little.

Key ingredients for Yukjeon Sogogijeon Beef Pancakes

These quick and simple meat kogijeon pancakes are a firm favorite of mine when I have dinner guests. They taste delicious and can be artfully plated as an appetizer or part of the main meal.

➜ Serving

Serve Kaplice cmunda warm as a hearty lunch or dinner. To lighten up the meal, put fresh veggies or a homemade vegetable salad alongside the stuffed potato pancake.

For a nicer display, sprinkle the potato pancake with chopped green herbs, such as parsley.

YukJeon Korean Beef Pancakes in Korea & Hawaii

Yukjeon beef pancakes are served by street food vendors in Korea. I’ve seen them pan-fry very, very large pieces of thin beef, and then cut it up into bite-sized pieces with scissors after they have finished cooking.

This method is probably more efficient as you would only need to coat one large piece of meat in batter, but you’d also need a very large frying pan to make beef jeon.

You might also be interested to know that meat jun was introduced to Hawaii many decades ago by Koreans, and remains popular and widely eaten to this day.

➜ Ingredients

Smoked pork; fully cooked, such as ham or pork chops. Ideally boneless, one slice pro pancake
Sauerkraut; if you don’t have access to Czech sauerkraut, I recommend buying German or Polish sauerkraut in a European deli. These are the most similar in taste to Czech fermented cabbage.

For potato pancakes

Raw potatoes; Yukon gold or Russets if you are based in the US. Any potatoes with a medium to high starch content are fine. Waxy potatoes are not very good for making Czech potato pancakes.
Whole milk; hot
Eggs
All-purpose flour; or plain flour if you are in the UK
Fresh garlic; peeled and crushed or pressed cloves
Dried marjoram; a typical Czech herb!
Salt and black pepper; to taste
Lard (Sadlo); or sunflower/rapeseed oil, to fry pancakes

✅ You’ll find the exact amount of ingredients below in the recipe card, which you can also print out.

How to make Yukjeon Sogogijeon Beef Pancakes

Yukjeon Sogogijeon Beef Pancakes can be made by any beginner cook and they key ingredients are beef, flour and egg.

Historically, beef jeon have been a traditional Korean dish that was served to royalty. Nowadays, these Korean beef pancakes are enjoyed during special occasions, eaten as street food, or just part of an everyday meal.

Making a sauce for Jeon

Make the ssamjang sauce by mixing doenjang, gochujang, sugar, sesame oil, chopped green onion and grated garlic. If you prefer a spicer sauce, feel free to add gochujang to taste.

You can also make a more traditional jeon dipping sauce by combining soy sauce, vinegar, sugar, gochujang, chopped scallions, and toasted sesame seeds.

Gochugaru (Korean chili powder/flakes) are are more traditional addition to jeon dipping sauce, but I really like the piquant flavor of gochujang chili paste.

I use either sauce for dipping my yukjeon so you can pick the one to prefer or even try both!

Preparing Yukjeon Sogogijeon Beef Pancakes

Select a tender and high quality cut of beef that isn’t too fatty or tough. I’ve chosen a roasting joint (sirloin cut), which I’ve frozen for a few hours to make the beef firmer and easier to slice.

Thinly slice the beef into similar-sized pieces using a very sharp knife. You don’t want the beef slices too thick otherwise they will take too long to cook and the outer egg batter could potentially start bronwing/ burning.

Sometimes, I will marinate the slices in soy sauce, cooking wine, and sugar. Then I’ll refrigerated the marinated beef for serval hours before coating with flour and eggs.

However, this isn’t necessary and I often skip the marinade for beef pancakes when I’m in a rush.

Coat in Flour & Egg

Beat two eggs in a large bowl and season with salt and pepper.

Dredge in flour and then dip into beaten egg and stir. make sure to stir every beef slice so it can all be individually coated in egg mixture.

You don’t want them to clump together. I find it easier to use hands in this process.

Pan-fry the Beef

Heat a large non-stick frying pan on high heat. Add 3-4 tbsp oil (or a thin layer of oil). Take the beef slices and dip thoroughly in egg again- ensuring its very well coated.

This beef jeon recipe needs a lot of oil because otherwise the egg batter will stick to the pan, and detach itself from the beef. So it’s also important to use a non-stick pan or a very well seasoned cast-iron skillet to make this yukjeon.

Quickly place the battered beef slices in frying pan one-by-one. Cook for several minutes on each side, until golden-yellow and crispy.

If there are flecks of batter or burnt bits in the pan, give it a quick wipe using a paper towel before pan-frying the second batch.

Otherwise the tiny burnt batter bits will transfer onto the next batch of Korean beef pancakes and spoil the appearance. And from experience, they’re annoyingly difficult to pick off.

What to do with leftover egg after cooking jeon

Any leftover egg can just be poured into the pan and cooked on both sides. Eat this as a snack with the ssamjang sauce or dipping sauce.

Serve your Yukjeon Sogogijeon Beef Pancakes with a small dollop of ssamjang sauce and a small slice of onion. Eat immediately while they’re still crispy and warm.

What to eat with Korean Yukjeon

Meat jeon is also delicious in ssam lettuce wraps. I really like eating these with the ssamjang dipping sauce and raw onion, which perfectly complements the tender beef.

The beef sogogijeon also taste amazing dipped in the classic ‘jeon’ soy-based sauce and then wrapped in a leafy ssam.

You can also add a spoonful of rice to your ssam lettuce wraps with Yukjeon Sogogijeon Beef Pancakes, which will definitely make each bite more hearty and filling.

So basically, I think beef jeon are the perfect Korean dish to impress when eating solo, or entertaining friends and family!

More Korean Jeon Recipes