By Honorary Reporter Alexandra Kyriazi from Greece

Photos = Instagram 

July is coming but the weather now is hot in many Southern Hemisphere countries. Thus finding an effective method to cope with extremely high temperatures is essential.

Also this month, school and university exams and college entrance tests are being held in many countries, including Greece. So many students stay at home to study, and the heat only makes their stressful task even harder. Thankfully, the tasty Korean dessert bingsu is an easy solution to this problem. 

Bingsu is shaved ice with frozen milk or cream topped with a variety of things like fruit, cookies, chocolate and syrup. The most popular toppings are red bean paste and tteok (rice cake) as seen in patbingsu, a traditional Korean dessert that appears in records from the Joseon Dynasty (1392-1910).

Patibngsu is a traditional version of bingsu that uses red bean paste and tteok (rice cake).

Among the seemingly endless variety of flavors, the common ones are chocolate, strawberry and green tea. One of the biggest strengths of bingsu is the lack of limits on ingredients, meaning numerous combinations and versions are possible.

From left clockwise are strawberry bingsu, patbingsu, mango bingsu and corn flake bingsu.

I've also made my own version of bingsu. In summer 2020, I was searching for a cool dessert online, and saw a very beautiful dessert that was bingsu. I found a good recipe and made a few changes so that I could make a Greek version of bingsu with ingredients I had at home. 

For the dessert's base I used ice cubes I shaved in a mixer. For the toppings, I poured fresh milk for flavor and added chopped cherries and greek plain yogurt on top. Almost two years have passed and bingsu is now one of my favorite summer desserts.

Hope you make your own bingsu too by shaving ice or frozen milk and adding toppings for extra flavor. The heat can seem unbearable in summer but it's nothing that a spoon of bingsu cannot fix.

enny0611@korea.kr

*This article is written by a Korea.net Honorary Reporter. Our group of Honorary Reporters are from all around the world, and they share with Korea.net their love and passion for all things Korean.