INQUISITR.COM / Health & Lifestyle

South Korea Comes Up With An Ice Cream Hangover Cure [Video]

By Anne Sewell
Published on: 08:15 PST, May 28, 2016

Reportedly, people in South Korea drink a lot of alcohol, so hangover cures are big business in the Asian nation, and now they have come up with the perfect ice cream.

According to a 2014 World Health Organization report, South Koreans drink 12.3 liters of alcohol each on an annual basis, which is the most in the Asia-Pacific region, hence, the urgent need for a cure for that morning after hangover hell.

In fact, the hangover cure is reportedly a $125 million per year industry in South Korea, with a range of pills and foods said to make you feel better, along with makeup to soften and improve that day-after-boozing face.

Around four months ago, the Inquisitr reported that South Korea’s uneasy northern neighbors had come up with the perfect alcoholic drink, a special blend that could be consumed without any fear of suffering a hangover the next day.

North Korea not only dreamed up the perfect no-hangover alcohol, but they also made it good for you. It seems they replaced sugar as the core ingredient with scorched, glutinous rice and added ginseng to pep up drinkers’ health and vitality.

Not to be outdone, South Korea is working hard to fight that dreaded morning-after discomfort by offering tasty and enjoyable cures instead.

While they have already come up with a tasty hangover soup – apparently a staple on all Korean restaurant menus – a chain of convenience stores decided to come up with a more cooling solution and thought up the new hangover ice cream bar.

As reported by Reuters, anyone in South Korea that has overindulged the night before can now chow down on what is dubbed a “Gyeondyo-bar.” This tasty treat is made from grapefruit flavored ice cream infused with a little oriental raisin tree fruit juice, and reportedly, the name of the ice cream translates roughly to “hang in there.” Hang in there indeed.

Reportedly, it’s the juice that does the magic, leading to the success of the ice cream, and apparently, with raisin juice as the active ingredient, it really works. However, raisin fruit as a hangover cure is nothing new in South Korea, as they have been using it as a hangover treatment since the 1600s.

While this might sound unlikely, as reported by the NZ Herald, a study was published in the Journal of Neuroscience back in 2012 that found that raisin tree extract definitely helped to reduce the effects of intoxication in rats. However, with all those heavily intoxicated rats running around, there is no mention of whether they actually tried the experiment on humans.

Reportedly, South Korea suffers a loss in productivity of around $8 billion per year as a result of its inhabitants’ drinking habits, so the new Gyeondyo-bar could be a godsend to the business world. The new ice cream bar reportedly went on sale on Friday.

According to a press release by the convenience store chain Withme FS, the ice cream reportedly “expresses the hardships of employees who have to suffer a working day after heavy drinking, as well as to provide comfort to those who have to come to work early after frequent nights of drinking.”

But that’s not all – South Korea is reportedly exporting its hangover remedies, including their most popular beverage, Hut-gae Condition. The drink is made by a unit of the CJ Corp conglomerate and has been on sale in China, Japan, and Vietnam since 2014.

Hut-Gae Condition also features in a popular 2014 music video named, rather appropriately, “Hangover,” by the Gangnam-style Korean pop star Psy and U.S. rapper Snoop Dogg and featured in the video below.

[Photo via YouTube]

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