Gochujang Butter Noodles for the Sauce McDonald's Korea Just Sent Across Thirteen Asian Markets

Gochujang, the fermented Korean chilli paste, has moved well past specialty grocery aisles this year, and two pieces of news from September show how far. A 9 September report announced that the singer G-Dragon would front a McDonald's campaign launching in Korea on 17 September and expanding sequentially across thirteen Asian markets, built around a gochujang butter sauce used in new McCrispy and McSpicy items. Two weeks later, a 23 September report on Korean flavours entering global menus put a figure on the wider trend, noting gochujang exports reached 46.01 million dollars in the first eight months of 2026, a 10.1 per cent rise that outpaced overall sauce exports nearly three to one, with the same report noting that Marks and Spencer had launched a gochujang mayo and Tesco a gochujang chicken sandwich.

Why butter is the pairing worth copying

The specific combination McDonald's Korea settled on, gochujang plus butter rather than gochujang alone, is doing real work. Gochujang's heat is fermented and slow rather than sharp, and butter's fat coats the tongue and rounds off that heat into something closer to savoury-sweet than aggressively spicy, the same swicy logic driving hot honey elsewhere this year. Melting the two together into a sauce for noodles takes the pairing out of a fast-food wrapper and into a genuinely fast homemade dinner.

Ingredients, for two servings

• 200g dried udon or thick wheat noodles (7oz)
• 2 tablespoons unsalted butter
• 1 1/2 tablespoons gochujang
• 1 tablespoon soy sauce
• 1 teaspoon honey
• 1 garlic clove, finely grated
• 2 tablespoons pasta or noodle cooking water, reserved
• 1 spring onion, thinly sliced
• 1 teaspoon toasted sesame seeds
• 1 fried or soft-boiled egg per serving, optional

Method

Bring a large pot of water to the boil and cook the noodles according to the packet instructions until just tender. Just before draining, scoop out 2 tablespoons of the starchy cooking water and set aside; this small amount is what lets the sauce cling to the noodles rather than pooling at the bottom of the bowl.