BonVivant

Must be sold online and not in China. I would probably use this:

DIY lunch at the meat market. Sirloin and chuck flap tail. Half way through now. Couldn't take anymore garlic unless I could grill it. Nice soya bean and tofu soup with "brisket point" (see menu above). I'm a slow eater. Everyone is long gone.

At another market stall. Plain rice and bean porridge. Mung bean pancake. Seen from where I sat. This place has everything else, too. It's a very atmospheric market.

Lunch at the market. "Sausage" filled with rice, blood (and noodles?). Hot broth in a paper cup and salty shrimp sauce for dipping. The stall. Chicken feet, instestine stew, blood sausages. Koreans laugh in the face of winter! Even food stall benches have heating. Outside it's cold, inside everywhere it's boiling hot. Blasting heat comes from under the metro seats, floor heating in the house or room is on full blast night and day.

Bimbimbap with beef tartare. Two plates of lettuce, both with Korean dressings. Everyone was slurping this beef rib soup. I tried 1 of these later. Fillings are in the containers in right corner. Vienna is capital of all things breaded and deep-fried, Korea is capital of all things deep-fried (probably). Chewy dough filled with sweet potato noodles, onions and scallions. There's also a kimchi version.

Fishmonger is selecting my snails. Snail sashimi. The snail (4 in total). Fish sashimi. My abalones. Abalone sashimi. Grilled abalones.

I enjoy eating at cheap, homely restaurants and good thing they are common here. All it takes is to walk inside and see what the people are eating. Not all places have photos of the food. And forget for a moment you are a clean freak and perfectionist. (FYI, I haven't gotten sick yet in my 10 days here in Busan) The set-up here is first you have to walk through the kitchen to get to the table. The view from where I sat. Don't think I've seen men in the kitchen. A son or husband who brings food and clears the tables but never actually does the cooking. My filling and satisfying meal for 4 euros. Contains no meat, the delicious sauce has fermented fish in it. I was looking around to see how Koreans eat this meal and an elderly customer at the next table showed me how it's done. Dump the side dishes over the rice and mix everything up really well. That's why the rice bowl is big. It's mostly barley with some rice, and barley broth in a separate bowl to wash everything down with. They bring you another bowl of barley broth when you finish the first. Well, I prefer not to carelessly dump the side dishes on top of the rice.

Saw this creature in Hokkaido, Japan and now I finally tried it. First photo is live ones in water. Innards removed and served raw. It's like eating a live toad. The exterior is tough, the interior is jelly-like. Has a strong iodine smell. I had something similar in Chile but it's the dried version and no blob (look up Pyura chilensis). It could also be eaten briefly steamed. Ate 1 oyster with Gochujang, the rest the way I like it, plain. Blood cockles are usually big here. Sashimi because you are in Busan to eat fresh seafood. Seaweed soup with bones and bits leftover from your fish. Fishmonger's stall is directly in front of my table. You select what you want to eat and they prepare it for you behind the stall. First the booze. Korean pensioners at the next table.

There are many restaurants at the market and this is one of them where I had rice soup with pork, a lot of it. (Took me quite some time to remove most of the scallions.) An employee gestured these tiny fermented, salted shrimp should be added to the soup and I did. Notice the round chopsticks? Well, they do exist, just not as prevalent as the flat ones. Still it's easier for me to spear my food with any type of chopsticks. Restaurant looks much bigger from outside. Also, it's quite common to see many male pensioners who eat alone. This meat goes in the soup. Kitchen is outside. Broth is being cooked. Everything that goes in the soup comes from this:

Lunch at a market near my lodging. Since I know very little about Korean cuisine almost everything looks and tastes good to me. Ate some typical Korean dishes such as sweet potato noodles, fish paste on skewers, rice rolls and braised rice cakes. The stall where I ate: Enjoying myself immensely here in Busan. If you'd asked me 5 days ago "what's your favourite country in Asia", I would have told you "Japan". Now I am not so sure anymore!

A live octopus for lunch. A bit of a struggle to pick up the pieces with chopsticks as they wiggle constantly. One tentacle gets itself between the metal chopsticks in this photo. The tiny suckers also grip the plate so some strength is needed again if you want to eat it. Another octopus goes into a pancake, a speciality of this city Busan. The fish was alive 10 minutes ago... The most important shellfish in Korean aquaculture industry and they come from here in the south. My octopus is not amused to be picked up, it however finds it amusing to squirt water at me. According to the fishmonger this fish is in season at the moment. It's my sashimi now. Korean eat a lot of oysters. I also. --- Another lunch before boarding my train to Busan: "hangover stew with congealed blood". I am a vampire. Bibimbap with beef tartare.

First meal in Korea. One cuts the kimchi with a pair of scissors. Turnip kimchi and tender pork belly. This restaurant's speciality is mudfish soup. The fish in the soup (in a tank outside the restaurant). I'm here to compete in 2 Olympic events.

Thanks for your compassion. The roe is salmon. I have been eating all of this pretty much every day this week, actually. The oysters are on sale this week, coincidentally. I eat a massive amount of cheese every week anyway. But I will be without my best food (cheese) for 2 weeks (starting today)!

Nothing in the fridge to cook with as I'm leaving soon. My lunches lately have been nothing but cheese and bread, and oysters. I'm very content. Cured duck breast Aromatic Pont l'Eveque and Camembert. And a lot of cheese...

My inner Austrian is satisfied again. Home made potato dumplings. There's coarsely grated Hokkaido squash in the dough. Pumpkin seed oil and seeds to intensify the dumplings even more. Plain version of same dumplings, with Speck and Sauerkraut. (Plain) dumplings with ground pistachio and poppy seeds. Fresh plums marinated in maple syrup. Burrata, pumpking seed oil and grated salt-cured yolk. Making yolk confit next time for a change. Lunch in Düsseldorf, Germany the other day. Slow-cooked pork. Bratwurst from nearby Bergisches Land, with creamy chard. Schumacher Alt beer is quite nice, I can never just stop after 2. The beer keeps coming until you put a beer mat on top of the glass. This much of beer in the glass is as good as empty and the waiter will bring you another full glass in no time. The beer is properly dispensed by this man. OK, one more beer then we go. The brewery restaurant.

Ordering a (blue) rare steak in AR (Argentina) and CL (Chile) and getting it the way you want is a matter of luck. Doesn't matter how much you stress how you prefer it done half the time it comes out medium or worse. South Americans prefer other cuts of meat so the tender parts are perfect for tourists. These are typical cuts Argentinians prefer for their assado: Bavette/flank/skirt/picanha/tail of rump steaks, short ribs and so on. They start an assado with offal, then move on to the cuts. When I go that way again I will be carrying this photo of steak doneness with me to show them when ordering. Had the same experience in Namibia. I like AR empanadas, especially "caprese" (filled with chopped fresh tomatoes, mozzarella and basil). Couldn't stomach their beloved "medialunas" and bread with dulce de leche for breakfast. It's hell for someone who hates sugar. My AR breakfast: There's a craft beer scene in BA but the pubs tend to open in the evening only. Quality and selection could be better now. If you are not going to AR Patagonia anytime soon maybe you want to try Patagonian lamb in BA. I ate my fill on both sides of Patagonia and thought it was one of the best (second to Texel, perhaps. Not sure).

I know you are going to hit the supermarket sooner or later, do check out the wine section which is the length of an Olympic swimming pool! Wine is categorised by region and there's hardly anything from abroad. I almost "cried" in the wine section every time. (Same in Chile, btw.). Also try other red wines which are normal in AR but not anywhere else. I didn't even know of their existence. Nice wine can be bought nearly anywhere; convenience store, petrol station, corner shop, bus station etc. Got this at a bus station in Villa Gesell for my long-distance bus ride back to BA. Taking a break from Malbec and everything by Rutini is good.

Grim weekend, a first taste of nasty autumn weather that lasts for months. The lunches satisfy my inner Austrian. Dumplings with scrambled egg whites. The dumplings have kabocha squash puree in them which make them yellow. Egg whites give the dumplings some contrast. "Squeeze cheese" dumplings in a savoury broth. Not as nice as NinaGluck's, I'm quite certain. Same as above but with the additions of pumpkin puree and Speck. In Styria Speck is used in the dumplings. I made it seasonal by adding pumpkin puree. That's the Speck in my dumplings. I enjoyed both but with Speck and pumpkin puree it's even better. The nicer the cheese the nicer the dumplings.

Mine (in Strasbourg) And where I kept the beer.

Hungary is the world's biggest foie gras exporter (to France, specifically). Bulgaria is catching up fast, though. Get some foie, charcuterie and have a little picnic in your room.

With melted pure chocolate. 2 kinds of pumpkin spreads. I have not another wish for the entire week. All is included in this one picture. (Would not want to even consider moving to another place or country without access to French cheese!) The cheesemonger was happy to see me again... A new one to me, from the Jura. Very rich and creamy. Kaltbach Le Gruyère is epic and I get it whenever the cheesemonger has it. Almost nothing can touch Kaltbach. (Photo below is from last summer)

I put it on all kinds of things but mostly olive oil is added to the powder for drizzling. In (southern) Chile they also put it on pizzas. Found the pre-packaged merquen from supermarket to be sub-par. At the market in southern Chile, especially in the areas which are strongholds of Mapuche folks, the stallholders let you have a taste of their various versions of merquen before buying. Every stallholder has their own mixes and sources. I bought several kilos in total and whilst I enjoyed them all the best chilies were the whole dried smoked ones sold in a net. It's time I returned to Chile!

I have been to that Tintin shop and bought some stationary items there. Long story shot, how it all started: (have also been to Tibet, of course.) FYI, the mussels most probably come from Netherlands (the biggest mussel producer in Europe). One time when the mussel season was about to begin but deliveries were delayed and the Belgians all got their knickers in a knot. Going home tomorrow and looking forward to eating steamed mussels at home (eur.5/kg from supermarket. When in season, 2 kilos for the same price).

More about the "noses" on BBC: (video clip loads and plays immediately) http://www.bbc.com/travel/story/20170710-how-a-candy-divided-this-belgian-town I have never tried the noses and don't even want to (no sweet tooth).