\u201cEighteen years ago, people didn\u2019t even know the name of this ingredient,\u201d says 58-year-old Gil Sa-hyeon, holding up a cluster of dried brownish stems. \u201cNow it\u2019s everywhere.\u201d<\/p>\n
His shop, Joseon Yakcho, sits in the heart of Seoul\u2019s Yangnyeongsi Market, South Korea\u2019s largest traditional medicinal herb market, its streets lined with shops displaying buckets of herbs such as liquorice root and cinnamon bark that spill on to the pavements, filling the air with their distinct, earthy aroma.<\/p>\n
The ingredient Gil is referring to is hovenia dulcis, known in Korean as heotgae \u2013 the oriental raisin tree that\u2019s become the cornerstone of South Korea\u2019s booming hangover cure industry.<\/p>\n
South Koreans take their hangovers very seriously. For many, the morning-after ritual still involves a steaming bowl of haejangguk, or \u201changover soup\u201d.<\/p>\n
Often made with napa cabbage, dried pollack or even congealed oxblood, it\u2019s a comfort food as much as a cure, with specialist restaurants opening early for bleary-eyed regulars.<\/p>\n
More recently, though, the cure has gone commercial. Walk into any convenience store and you\u2019ll find entire sections dedicated to hangover remedies, from traditional drinks to trendy jelly sticks and tablets designed to ward off the suffering.<\/p>\n
Haejangguk \u2013 or Hangover soup – eaten as a hangover cure in Korean cuisine. Photograph: Woohyeok Choi\/Alamy<\/p>\n
Most contain extracts of hovenia dulcis, though some use other ingredients said to help, including red ginseng, milk thistle or even seaweed.<\/p>\n
The country\u2019s hangover cure market reached approximately 350bn won (\u00a3190m) in 2024, according to NielsenIQ Korea, up 10% from the year before.<\/p>\n
Despite the market\u2019s growth, South Koreans are actually drinking less<\/a>, with per-capita alcohol consumption falling steadily since 2015 and post-pandemic shipments of beer and spirits still below 2019 levels.<\/p>\n Analysts link the shift to a combination of factors, from companies cutting back on mandatory after-work boozy sessions to a health-conscious younger generation favouring moderation over binge drinking.<\/p>\n Prof Joo Young-ha, a cultural anthropologist at the Academy of Korean Studies who specialises in food culture, says the appeal of hangover products for younger drinkers is as much social as practical.<\/p>\n \u201cThey often buy multiple products in advance to share as gifts during drinking sessions, turning hangover prevention into part of the evening\u2019s etiquette,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n Taeyoung Hwang, an analyst at market research firm Mintel, says that while hangover recovery products remain niche markets globally, South Korea and Japan represent exceptions.<\/p>\n \u201cThey have mature and widely adopted hangover recovery product industries deeply tied to their respective drinking cultures,\u201d Hwang says.<\/p>\n According to Mintel\u2019s analysis, South Korea has launched the most hangover products globally in the past five years. Many have become \u201cindispensable daily consumer goods\u201d, with the so-called Korean Wave<\/a> enabling international expansion.<\/p>\n \u201cThe global popularity of Korean culture, including K-pop and K-food, is fuelling interest and driving demand for Korean hangover recovery drinks in markets like south-east Asia and beyond,\u201d Hwang says.<\/p>\n Hovenia dulcis is often promoted as an age-old Korean remedy. Many articles claim that it features prominently in traditional medicine, but experts say this is often overstated.<\/p>\n Above: Gil Sa-hyeon outside his traditional medicine shop, Joseon Yakcho, in Seoul\u2019s Yangnyeongsi Market. While hovenia dulcis appears in classical Chinese medical texts \u2013 which historically influenced Korean medical scholarship \u2013 it was incorporated into Korean medical literature in later centuries and only recently became a commercial phenomenon, part of a broader movement to retroactively attribute traditional health benefits to modern products.<\/p>\n \u201cInterest in hovenia dulcis for hangover relief only began in the early 1990s, starting with Japanese patents, then Korean scientific research followed,\u201d says Dr Choi Goya from the Korea Institute of Oriental Medicine<\/p>\n Testing the claims<\/p>\n Studies in South Korea have examined various parts of hovenia dulcis for potential detoxifying effects, though evidence remains largely limited to animal research.<\/p>\n In laboratory settings, researchers found fruit extracts of hovenia dulcis reduced blood alcohol concentration in rats, and fermented fruit vinegar reduced levels of both alcohol and acetaldehyde \u2013 the toxic compound produced when the body breaks down alcohol.<\/p>\n Scientific literature has also found that the plant increased activity of alcohol dehydrogenase, an enzyme that breaks down alcohol, and may protect the liver from alcohol-related damage.<\/p>\n However, the body of research has major limitations, including studies of different plant parts, a lack of high-quality human clinical trials, and inconsistent quality standards.<\/p>\n Medical researchers remain broadly sceptical about hangover remedies, though a King\u2019s College London systematic review<\/a> found<\/a> hovenia dulcis fruit extract among several substances showing statistically significant results in human trials, albeit with very low-quality evidence.<\/p>\n Bags of dried herbs and botanicals outside Joseon Yakcho, a traditional medicine shop in Seoul\u2019s Yangnyeongsi Market. Photograph: Raphael Rashid<\/p>\n Until recently, Korean companies could make hangover cure claims without needing proof, which prompted local regulators to crack down on the industry.<\/p>\n In January 2025, new rules<\/a> required companies to conduct human trials<\/a> showing measurable improvements in things like hangover symptoms and blood alcohol clearance.<\/p>\n Companies that failed to do so have until October to provide new evidence or face a ban on hangover-related marketing claims entirely.<\/p>\n For many, though, hangover remedies are perhaps less about scientific certainty and more about comfort, routine, and the shared culture of drinking.<\/p>\n Lee So-young, a 26-year-old office worker, has been buying hangover products since university.<\/p>\n \u201cI don\u2019t know if they really work,\u201d she says. \u201cBut they\u2019re cheap, and sometimes I do actually feel better. That\u2019s good enough for me.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"\u201cEighteen years ago, people didn\u2019t even know the name of this ingredient,\u201d says 58-year-old Gil Sa-hyeon, holding up…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":41969,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[33],"tags":[163,85,46,482],"class_list":{"0":"post-41968","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-medication","8":"tag-health","9":"tag-il","10":"tag-israel","11":"tag-medication"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/41968","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=41968"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/41968\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/41969"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=41968"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=41968"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=41968"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
Right: Gil Sa-hyeon holds hovenia dulcis, known as oriental raisin, a key ingredient in hangover remedies. Photograph: Raphael Rashid Photograph: Raphael Rashid<\/p>\n