Why Is Korean Cream Cheese Garlic Bun Suddenly On Menus Everywhere?

While browsing for trending Korean foods in my city, I noticed a fascinating shift in the K-food wave. We have seen a rise in Korean flavors with McDonald's and Burger King launching special gochujang sets and Korean ramen taking over Maggie's dominance. However, what was more peculiar than that was the endless offering of Korean cream cheese garlic buns. Regardless of the restaurant's main course, they offered Korean garlic bread to go along.

Curious to understand why this particular item had gained such traction, we must look into what made it so appealing. Korean cream-cheese garlic buns are sweet and savory at once. The dominant taste is rich garlic butter (often with herbs), but it’s carefully balanced by a sweetened cream-cheese filling. Texturally, the buns are uniquely soft and fluffy inside, while the exterior crisps up slightly during baking. It makes the top of the bun golden and crunchy, whereas the interior is almost custard-like and tender.

In contrast to Western-style garlic bread (made from baguette slices and olive oil), the Korean version uses individual milk roll buns. The overall effect is a bread that is intensely garlicky yet noticeably sweet, with a meltingly soft, buttery-cream interior and a crisp exterior. Delicious! Let's dig in and find out more about this yummy Korean snack.

What’s the Origin of Korean Cream Cheese Garlic Bun?

The Korean cream-cheese garlic bun, locally popular as yukjjok maneul-ppang (육쪽마늘빵), literally means “six-sided garlic bread.” It originated in the port city of Gangneung in Gangwon Province, where the boutique bakery Pain Famille popularized it as a street-food snack. Its recipe requires soft, round milk buns, sliced nearly through without breaking apart completely into six segments. This hollow is later filled with sweetened cream cheese and then dunked in a rich garlic-butter custard.

A viral video of the bread’s baking process in the late 2010s made yukjjok maneul-ppang an internet sensation, spreading its fame across Korea and beyond. A Korean tourism site, VisitSeoul, notes that this Korean snack has become synonymous with K-Bread worldwide. Even today, the recipes for Korean-style garlic bread pop up on short-form media such as TikTok, IG Reels, and YouTube Shorts. However, its recipe has changed over the years.