Travelogue: Spring Break 2009 -- Seoul

[Peter Green]

Can someone fill me in on the gaebul?  I have to admit that the picture up-thread took me aback and I am absolutely sure that if I had ever seen them before I would remember.

I tried to google, but most of the info is contained in blogs and I'm at work so that content is blocked.

I did get that they're eaten as sashimi.  What else?  What do they taste like?

Thanks

Rhonda

←

Hi, Rhonda

We came across gaebul on the East Coast last trip.. Sheena coined their name, so I can't take credit for that.

These things are usually tossed in at the front of most seafood meals. You don't order them, really, they just show up, as was the case when we had this order a couple of years back. They're the ones on the right hand side of the tray. Circumcised...errrrr...skinned, they're an odd purple in colour, and, like the octopus legs, they're usually still squirming when you eat them. (The orangey stuff to the left of the shot is mongae "sea squirt")

I can't say the flavour of them does much for me, but to each their own.

[PopsicleToze]

Peter, thanks for the info. Good to know that I'm not missing much

Love your blogs and always look forward to more

Thanks

Rhonda

[Peter Green]

March 23 – That Missing Hour

(The live action version is

)

I’d stepped out, for what was to be just a brief reconnoiter.

However, with a camera in either hand (the video and the still), and several bottles of soju under the belt, this wasn’t likely to be brief.

I pushed back behind the direct sales, and worked my way onto the packing floor. Like Tsukiji, there were small hills of Styrofoam about, and more coming in, as fast as the forklifts and musclepower could manage.

There were also stacks of empty orange-coloured plastic crates. These were in the process of being kicked, tossed, and carted about like extras in a Texas Chain Saw flick.

A few seconds later, and things started making sense. The orange crates were being laid out in orderly rows, and water was being poured into them.

But the more I looked, the more I found. But everything seemed awfully quiet, and, well….relaxed.

It was also quite friendly. One fellow pointed at his watch, and I gathered from his gestures that I needed to wait another fifteen minutes. He bought me a cup of coffee, while he had some tea and a hardboiled egg.

After an exchange of smiles, he returned to talking with the ajima who was running the coffee trolley. Nearby some guys were trading jokes and cigarettes, and the place had a nice, village-like atmosphere.

Korean coffee. Powdered and already mixed in with sugar. You can’t get away from the sugar. Mind you, in my current state (surprisingly lucid, too, I might add) the heat of the coffee and the accompanying sugar rush was quite welcome.

I contemplated one of the little bottles, knowing they’d be some concoction of caffeine, caffeine, and probably some more caffeine, but figured I’d leave myself in the capable hands of my metabolism.

I must’ve slipped into one of those happy moments of stupor, as when I looked around, my new friend was tugging at my sleeve and pointing me in a direction back the way I’d come.

Those ranks of orange coloured crates were now being filled out with fish. They were tossed in, and, as they hit, suddenly came thrashing back to life, matrix-like.

From a fairly haphazard assemblage, the fish were moved about, evening out each lot. Then someone would hoist the crate up onto a vintage scale, and someone else would note the details of the lot number and weight down on a scrap of paper.

An auctioneer’s podium wheeled by on the back of a small truck-like thing, reminding me of a portable guillotine.

And around then, someone started singing to the fish.

At least that’s what it sounded like. An odd, ululating cry that rang out over the floor. It drew me across the hall over to where the podium had set up.

Folks were walking about the fish boxes and taking notes. Meanwhile a group of buyers in the back were standing up on a ledge with a vantage over the wares.

You know they’re buyers, as they’ve all got baseball caps with numbers attached. They’re either buyers, or else they’re all playing some odd game I know nothing about.

Up on the podium, Mr. Auctioneer ends his call, his buddy on the laptop beside him gives a bow, and then the pace changes.

I’ve had Yoonhi listening to the fellow on the video segment. She has no idea what he’s saying. It’s like making sense out of one of those guys selling cattle. But hands were waving, sales were being made, and the big board was rolling through the numbers.

It was a fun thing to sit through. Livelier than the tuna auction at Tsukiji. People would smile and bow to me, and nobody seemed to mind the tourist with the camera. Maybe it's just that there are way too many tourists at the Tokyo fish market. There certainly weren't any guided groups here.

This guy could keep up a patter. When the auctioneer finally took a breath after a few minutes, the lots were sold, and they were getting ready to move the podium to the next location.

It wasn’t just fish going up on the block. There were palates of really impressive looking octopi out on the floor. These weren’t things Scud would be trying to fit into his mouth in one go.

One of the many good things about an octopus is that you can pretty much pack it into any shape you want. You can lay it out neatly for maximum display; you can form fit it to a Styrofoam box; or you can just jam it in.

Crab, however, take a little more effort, but they still looked extremely tidy for something with that many legs.

And meanwhile, there was more fish. There’s always more fish.

All that blood on the floor made me hungry

I couldn’t have been gone from the restaurant for very long, could I?

[Peter Green]

March 23 – Something About Mary

Scud had had the benefit of napping in the restaurant, and Jason had an equivalent edge from not having had as much soju as I did, so I woke up to find the both of them perched on the edge of the bed watching baseball in the early afternoon. Scud had his jar of sugar to get him going.

With the game out of the way, I decided this was a day when we should do things of interest to Scud. Things that didn’t involve watching the sun come up.

The boy needed to get North of the river for some culture. So I packed him out of the house, onto the underground, and across the Han to Anduk station.

We were going to Insadong – “known to foreigners as Mary’s Alley”.

Serena had enjoyed Insadong a lot, and I was pretty certain that Scud would, too. Traveling with kids (of any age) can be challenging, and it's good to have a few cards up your sleeve.

I know Insadong is ground zero for what passes for tourism in this town, but I have a soft spot for the place. Back in the early 90’s, when everything was going the way of poured concrete and cinder block, Insadong was the one part of town where you could get a sense of the old architecture, and find a lot of the traditional crafts that were being pushed aside in the last drive towards modernization. It had been a centre for the antique trade since the Japanese Occupation, and has held onto that purpose since then.

It was Insadong where I had my first pufferfish (and we had no idea what we were eating at the time). It was Insadong where I started loading up on brushes, ink, and good paper. Insadong is where I found the great summer salad idea of using the dressing as a granite, in the quiet courtyard of Biwan. The teahouse – Feel Like Throwing The Flowers – showed me how you could turn a basement into a two story restaurant. And book stores. Lots of book stores.

Yes, there’re scandals concerning the knock-offs and the fakes (check out the Joong An Daily for more details), but I still like stopping by.

But does anyone know where the name “Mary’s Alley” came from? My old 1990 Lonely Planet referred to Insadong by that name, and you still find the reference here and there, but outside of the standard “US soldiers started calling it Mary’s Alley” there’s no reason I can find for the name. Is there a St. Mary's church nearby? Yoonhi says that, from when she was a kid (and dinosaurs roamed the Earth) that "Mary" was the generic name for American pets (dogs in particular). But that's a bit out there.

Anyways, Insadong or Mary's Alley, it’s also a good spot to find food (as if that’s ever a problem in this town).

At the top of the hill, at the main intersection, a lady was selling traditional sweets. These are the hard white ones you can use as a hockey puck if you need to, some plain shards, and others filled with nuts and sold in a roll. Beside her, enjoying the warmth, a fellow sells roasted chestnuts.

The main drag is good for street sales, but the side alleys are where the restaurants and some of the better antique dwellers are hiding.

A lot of the places down here are doing set tables – hanjeongsik – lots of pretty dishes set out in a proper meal.

Decisions, decisions. Finally, I chose this place.

Attractive, quite upscale, with a certain funkiness about it. But do they have to have a television running in every Korean restaurant?

Where there’s chon, there’s makkeoli, and I was in a dongdongju mood. Scud had his glass of coke, and I had my bowl. This one was a ginseng dongdongju so I was obviously doing good things for my health. (And you could definitely taste the ginseng in this).

There was acorn jelly with a tangy sauce, and marinated beef.

Scud ordered the pork fried up with chili and soybean. Gochu chaeyu bokkum. This had one of those pleasant burns that sneaks up on you..

For me, it was chon. Kim chi chon. This is one of those perfect matches – the oil, the crunch of the fired vegetables, the batter, and then the enveloping happiness of the dongdongju embracing everything.

We lingered a bit, Scud exercising his prerogative of adolescent indolence. I enjoying my refreshing beverage.

But it was already going on mid-afternoon, and our day would soon be over. We headed back to the street.

As I’d said, the street is also a good place for food. Do you need a bag of popped stuff? Straight from the bang to you?

And I did look about at some of the pottery. The Koreans make some beautiful ceramics, and a good portion of our serving ware has been built up over our trips here.

This time, I was of the mind to get a sake flask for traveling. It’s one of those things a gentleman traveler should just have in his kit.

Of course, we had to go to Toto. What boy wouldn’t be thrilled with that jammed mass of McDonald Happy Meal toys, action figures, and vintage soft drink bottles?

Anyone recognize these? Lotte and Hette. There’re bottles of Sunny on the top, and Oran-C down below (and Coke and Fanta, but those are easy).

If you’re traveling with kids, this is a place where they’ll find something they can identify with.

And, of course, what boy won’t want to spend hours drooling over sharp pointy things?

And, yes, along with the walls of pikes, katana, broadswords, daggers, other fun stuff, there are also examples of kitchenware to look over. At least, I could look over. Scud was back with the longswords.

(As a useful note, if you need oiling sets and oil for carbon steel blades

Back on the street, there were a number of familiar sights.

The Dragon’s Beard guys were still there, running their patter, showing the folding process of working up from one piece to 16,384 strands, which are finished with honey, nuts, and sesame.

It’s always fun to watch them do this, in a mesmerizing sort of manner. And the sales people for this always have such a great routine down. They know the pitch, and they enjoy delivering it.

(And, yes, I did buy another box. They’re good.)

There was a stall a few meters away with interesting looking stuff. They had things of batter lathered with bean paste that I don’t recognize. Is it just another shape of hoddeok?

And there are those evil yam fries. You think you’re getting shoestring potatoes, and what you end up with are slivers of yam so hard you could use them as nails.

And there were bungeo. There was no way we were missing out on goldfish, so Scud and I ordered one each.

We were getting rather full by now. A pity, as I would’ve been interested in seeing if the “spawn potage” was a tribute to Todd McFarlane. I can only imagine what they’d put in it.

And, besides the traditional, there was plenty of the modern. Coffee, hot chocolate….but can you legitimately call something yogurt ice cream? (yogeotu aisu kkurim).

And here was the chance to stock up on yeot (the traditional candy) at wholesale prices.

And the hoddeok ladies are still there. And they still had a line up.

Scud and I had some. Scud just treated his with a bit more caution this time.

The sweets window had a stunning display of ddeok. Gureumddeok on the left top – “Black cloud”? – with a mix of beans in the modeum kkongchal ddeok below; cranberry seolgi (with the hearts); and heukimja mali ddeok and beji mali ddeok (“mali” is “roll”).

And chapssal ddeok, with macadamia flavour.

If you like mochi, this is the store to be at. Traditional and not so traditional soft rice cakes.

And next door you can get your honey sweet potato fix satisfied.

And what’s street food without some sausages?

And stuff on sticks. Either meats on the grill, or odeang in the sauce.

And I could smell the bundaeggi (silk worm larvae) from a distance. Nothing I did or said was going to convince Scud to try this (and I’d already done my one attempt last trip – it wasn’t going to happen again).

The things on the lollipop sticks are candy. These are like the ones that Yoonhi and Serena had on Myeongdong last time, the goal being to use a safety pin to tap out the shape in the middle without breaking anything.

And this stand had stuffed squid – ojingeo sundae. I was really feeling sad at this point about not being able to eat more, but the fried stuff from earlier was filling me up.

Finally, we came out at the bottom of the street at Tapgol (Pagoda) Park. This park (the first modern one in Seoul) was where the Korean declaration of independence was first read out in 1919.

And, on that historical note, Scud and I had to think about dinner.

Luckily, we were thinking with our heads, because our stomachs were telling us to stop already.

[Shelby]

Peter, LOVE the video of the octopus!!!!!!!!! I know that I'll never get the opportunity to eat it fresh like that and your description of how it feels in your mouth made me feel like I was almost eating it!

[Peter Green]

....your description of how it feels in your mouth made me feel like I was almost eating it!

←

I hope that was a good thing.

[Hiroyuki]

Silk worm larvae!? I'm not a fan, but my father, who was born in Nagano (aka Shinshu), would be delighted to find them in Korea!

Gragon's Beard, 16,384 strands! Very intriguing!

Did you actually have one of those taiyaki (bungeo in Korean?)? Do they taste like Japanese taiyaki?

[Pan]

The photos of food in that restaurant are making me salivate! I'm surprised by how neat that alley is. Are alleys usually that neat in Seoul?

[Shelby]

....your description of how it feels in your mouth made me feel like I was almost eating it!

←

I hope that was a good thing.

←

Oh it was, it was!

I'm so envious of you!

[Joon]

Sheena - there's a crunchy snack here that is a pack of round, marble size crunchy balls filled with squid essense. The outside wafer/cookie tastes of peanut while the inside filling screams of squid. It's weird but it works. Heck I even saw Rain eating it between his MTV rehearsal outtakes.

←

Funny cuz there's a korean snack that's the exact opposite - Squid flavored crunchy balls filled with peanuts!

Edit: I guess you guys went over that already

Edited June 15, 2009 by Joon (log)

[Peter Green]

March 23 – Song of the North

When we did dinner at Star Chef the other day, FatManSeoul had had some very good things to say about a restaurant on the North side of the city. And Zen had chimed in on this.

That’s enough incentive to get me going on a death march.

My intention, following upon Insadong for culture (and some food), was to head towards the Chongngo 3 Ga subway station, and from there head up to Hanseong University by rail.

En route to the station, however, amidst the omnipresent stalls selling chon and fried egg rolls (with spring onion and sometimes seaweed – “gim” - and odaeng and deokbokki and I’m getting hungry again…….)

I found something that I’d only heard about in legends.

The Korean donut….fresh from the oil!

Yoonhi remembers this from her tip back in the late 70s. If it’s bread based, and you can open it up…..put coleslaw in it.

You may have to squint a bit, but there they were. Sugared buns stuffed wih cabbage and mayonnaise. Plus, you can get them with glow in the dark neon red sauce.

Yoonhi things the one you see just to the left may be mayonnaise filled.

And there’s an even chance that the sugar coated ones to the right will have a sweet bean filling (ppat) like the goldfish.

I was still walking off the Insadong stuffing, and Scud refused to eat one for me.

What’s the point in having children, I ask?

++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

Rising like Orpheus from the underworld, Scud (hardly Eurydice, but what the Hades) was hard upon my heals….which is a fancy way of saying he was lagging back there somewhere complaining about my dragging him all over the place.

We were heading North up the main drag – Seongbukdonggil -from Hanseong station. This was like another world from the towering (okay, maybe stooping) high rises of the South.

Villas, open streets, cafes…..the first “large” building to catch my eye was a bakery, Napoleon (which FatMan tells me is famous in its own right - and please jump in here, anyone, with details to relate!).

Okay, this isn’t quie the same culture shock you get going into Yongsan base. That’s another level of weird. That’s like a trip into Pleasantville, with M16s. This had a nice…..neighborhood feel to it. Something more than the concrete jungle I was growing used to south of the Han.

Of course, with any Korean neighborhood, there’s food.

There were the usual chains. I was growing used to seeing Two Two everywhere, with it’s logo of “chicken.draft beer.drink”………

Y’know, I was just reading about a bacon flavoured vodka. I wonder if there’s a market for chicken flavoured soju?

But for every franchise, there was more than enough local content to balance things out. This looked good. Chamnamu dak nara, which Yoonhi agreed is close to “chicken the way you like it”.

But this wasn’t our destination.

We continued up the hill. Scud wasn’t keen on this introduction of gravity, but we pressed on.

Up the hill, and with altitude the scale also climbed. Very upscale, with expensive restaurants and cafes and galleries, and churches galore. (I forget how Christian Korea is at times, an anomaly of sorts in Asia.)

And there, finally (Scud was in the cold, grumbling stage) we found it, just when we thought we wouldn’t.

Actually, the key factor here was that I’d opened my cell and had called FatMan. This is a guarantee that it must be close…..as in “right under my eyes”.

So, what was my impression?

Funky.

If you ask me to describe this place, I’ll go Motown on you. Funky is the word.

Consider the location. It’s nestled into a drop in the road like a tick into an armpit. You have to descend perilously to the entrance to get to the door, and it’s still precipitous once you get inside. I suggested to Scud that it was like Alice down the rabbit hole, but he just grunted.

And the décor?......In contrast to the plush joints down the hill, this had the feel of moonshine, board shops, and altered states.

Inside, well, like I said, funky. But maybe with some early Jefferson Airplane to go with it. Greens and blues, and the feeling that there should be a bong about here somewhere with a caterpillar.

It’s not huge, by any means. They were full when we first arrived, and we had to wait a bit. “Full” means they have, like, twelve customers. There’re only five tables in all, and you’d be hard pressed to fit two people at some of them. No crowding, though, lots of space, they just don’t feel they need to get too “rushed”.

If I was going to build a place myself, it would probably look like this. Okay, this is probably better leveled than what I would do…..

Now, given that I’d already humiliated myself (“what sort of a guy asks for directions?”) FatMan showed up to join us, being in the area (in part, I believe, to taunt me for asking for directions ☺ ). This was a good thing, as Scud was still a little sullen over the hike. We needed some outside company to keep us civil.

The first question was this! Coffee beer. How did they do this? It was good!

The answer? Generic beer – Hite, I think, with a shot of espresso in it. This works really, really well. I’m sort of in shock that this isn’t already a craze in Vancouver and the Pac NorthWest, given the propensity for java and hops there.

Ribs for the boy, artfully displayed, although I didn’t find anything striking in the flavour. Still, pork is pork, and that’s a good thing.

What I’d come for was this. A cheese melt of baked pumpkin stuffed with ddeok, green chilis, and some other stuff under there. For a cold Seoul evening, this is comfort food, right up there with budaechiggae and nachos.

The chilis and cheese combination is one of those things that just works well. Background that with the stringy, rich texture of pumpkin, and you have a winner. While most people will, I know, have references in TexMex, for me, biting into it, I was thinking of hema dase, and nights in Bhutan.

I see why Fatman likes this place. It has the feel of a couple of surf bums that have washed up somewhere and thrown together something they’d like to do.

Plus, while the menu is limited, they’re looking to working the Korean dishes up to something more than what Jason describes as “ghetto food”. I like ghetto food, but it can also form a static boundary, and a lot of the people I’d been talking with had been coming up against that more and more often.

I’ll come back to that in the closing parts of this thread.

I wish I’d had more appetite, but then I wouldn’t have had as much fun earlier. No, I enjoyed what we had here (particularly the coffee beer). I like the attitude of the guys here, and if I was living in this part of Seoul, I see how it’d be easy to be a regular here.

edited - I have to come up with more synonyms for "here", obviously

Meanwhile, of course, we’d been talking about everything under the sun Korean, particularly movies and foodstuff.

That sort of talk calls for a drink.

Next: A Drink

Edited June 17, 2009 by Peter Green (log)

[Peter Green]

March 23 (still) – A Wee Dram

Our next phase had to involve drinking. FatManSeoul (whom I will now abbreviate to FMS) had a favourtie spot not too far away. This was over at the Hyehwa Rotary. I messed up with the name, thinking it was “Beautiful Ghetto”, but FMS has advised that that was just a play their were advertising.

This area is the “off Broadway” theatre district of Seoul, it would seem. When most of Seoul University moved south of the river it left behind a solid imprint of university culture, with a host of small theatres as well as a number of interesting food and drink alternatives like this one.

And, if you want makkeoli and dongdongju, you need to find this culture.

I wanted to find it. Scud wanted to go home. The good thing about kids this age is you can just point them at the underground, and sooner or later they’ll get where they’re supposed to be. You just hope they have all of their organs when they get there.

Like Song’s Kitchen, the décor is fun. The bookshelves of planks and bricks are an immediate note of nostalgia for anyone who’s done university time. Plus, they keep a selection of extra guitars on hand if the mood should take you.

It’s Asia, so we’re going to be eating with this.

But first, drinking! We started with standard, good old makkeoli. Poured from a kettle. Cloudy in body, and with that distinctive tang. This was a much richer drink than the bottled stuff I’d been making do with back at home.

First up for food was our chon. Packed with spring onion and seafood, you tug at it with your chopsticks and get a piece to chase down your makkeoli.

We talked, of course, about food and drink. Mainly about food. FMS has worked outside of Seoul, and is a wealth of knowledge on Andong, the source of many of the foods on display at the exhibit we took in back in 2007.

And, in discussing Andong, we also touched upon soju. Soju in the provinces can be a much different thing to what we find in Seoul. In Andong the traditional soju will run at 90 proof, and, according to FMS, has the taste of “drinking gym socks, in a pleasant way”.

I can work with that.

But, there was no traditional soju here, and our purpose was makkeoli, the farmer’s drink. Next was the nurungji makkeoli. This has the flavour of burnt rice scrapings from the bottom of the pot. This is a flavour that was almost lost when the modern rice cookers came into fashion, with their perfect cooking failing to burn the bottom. Now there are factories that purposefully burn rice to make commercial nurungji.

However, given that they’re making their own stuff here (at least the next kettle-full was), I expect they’re burning their own rice here.

And you certainly smell the nurungji.

The third beverage on their list was sweet bean makkeoli. This was so thick that I’d think of it more as a dongdongju.

We were still talking about Andong. Beside the soju, Andong had also come to national attention with the Andong chicken craze of a few years back. This was chicken, potatos, carrots, and onion simmered in a sweet soy base, and then served with the stretchy mung bean noodles (dangmyen).

The owner thought well of his fish, so, having finished our chon, we had this brought out, butterfly’d and grilled.

This also gave us an excuse to order more makkeoli.

FMS also talked of another famous Andong dish that’s managed to fasten itself on what’s left of my brain. But let me talk about that in the next post.

When it came time to leave, the owner chatted with us about video projects and performances. Like Song’s Kitchen, I could see how this sort of a place could get to be regular, being more than just a bar.

And so, a relatively early night, even with the long commute back south to Jason’s place.

Next: Hongeo

[Peter Green]

Hongeo – skating away

Okay, I promised I'd write about this.

Skate's a fish I have fond memories of. Ages back, on Cordova St in Vancouver, there was a small French restaurant I'd take Yoonhi to - La Marmite.

One of their dishes that I'd have on regular basis was fried skate with capers. The meat was chewy, and very fresh.

Good memories of the 1970s.

But, in Andong, skate are wrapped up in straw and left for a long, long time to ferment.

Here’s where it gets interesting.

When you consider the skate, it seems that, lacking the usual tackle, they excrete through their skin. This in turn gives them a distinctive smell, somewhat akin to the bathroom in a backwoods Kenyan pub. (And this explains the lemons that we saw in the tank at Noryangjin Market earlier).

Basically, you’re pickling this in its own urine.

If you remember my comments on the smell of bundaeggi (simmered silk worm larvae)……well….hongeo makes that seem like kid’s stuff.

You can eat it plain as is. You can eat it in a soup. And it’s famous for dumplings.

FMS describes it as “like chewing on a rubbery urinal cake”.

And, as bad as this sounds, it’s addictive.

I’ve got to get to Andong next trip!

[Peter Green]

Correction to the earlier March 23 posting.

But for every franchise, there was more than enough local content to balance things out.  This looked good.  Chamnamu dak nara, which Yoonhi agreed is close to “chicken the way you like it”.

←

Yoonhi just had a look at this post, and her immediate reaction was "what are you talking about?"

So scrub the "chicken the way you like it".

Anyone want to jump in with the proper translation?

Edited June 19, 2009 by Peter Green (log)

[Peter Green]

March 24 – The Breakfast of (Almost) Champions

It was a minor miracle. We were awake, and it wasn’t yet past noon.

But there was purpose to this madness. We’d been following the World Baseball Classic the last week, and the finals were on today, with the age old rivalry between Korea and Japan having once again reared its scaly head.

And we were heading out to Jamshil stadium to watch the Los Angeles match with thousands of other Koreans.

All of that is a long-winded way of explaining why your’re catching us eating breakfast.

We stayed close. Just down the hill west from Banpo Station. Our initial plan was to hit up a budaechigae place that Jason likes – General Pak’s Budaechigae – but it was closed.

There was a Pizza School, but Jason shuddered at that idea. And then just a couple of doors down, there was a fine example of the non-descript kimbap joint. Two ajimas running the place, a kimbap station at the window, papers on the walls announcing what else there was, big cans of Ottogi tuna piled up, and an air that said “enjoy your food and get out quick”.

I like these places.

A fine table setting of takuan, marinaded ggenip, pechu kimchi, and a nice wet kimchi with something like pinenuts (?) in it.

Scud had yugaejang, hunks of meat and ferns (kosari) in a biting broth.

I’m a big fan of kosari. Yoonhi has a connection with some of the grannies that harvest in Vancouver’s parks, and so we keep a stock of this on hand back home (it dries very well).

And Jason had a big bowl of raboggi – ramen in there along with the deok. I consider this just an excuse to eat starch, as if you need an excuse.

And for myself, I had a big, sizzling bowl of denjang chigae. Fermented soybean, chilis, tofu, and more chilis.

I was feeling quite civilized. Even my head was feeling better (makkeoli nights can catch up with you). I was ready for sports.

Little did I know.

Next: Take Me Out to the Ball Game

[Peter Green]

March 24 – 15,000 People Watch a Jumbotron

I’ll post somewhere else on Korean sports culture, and what it means if you’re the only foreigner in the stadium.

The key point to focus on here, is what to eat at a ball game.

For most of us, the hot dog is the icon of baseball dining. Perhaps a bag of nachos, or even a cold beer.

At least we have the beer in common.

Approaching the stadium, the first thing you notice (well, at least that I notice) are the stands selling dried fish and dried squid…..along with cold beer.

Of course, there are some of the usual suspects about, but they didn’t seem to be doing a thriving business (still, everyone was on their way inside the stadium).

(I'm confused. "One shot" is a term tied in with soju culture. How did it get associated with soft ice cream at Burger King?)

We settled down for the heartbreak with bags of stuff that seemed to be fried prawn parts, and a large number of 500ml (o-baek) cans of Hite.

Interestingly, we seemed to be the only ones with food and beer. This may be one of the only times I’ve ever seen so many Koreans not eating and drinking for so long.

Many, many beers, and a disappointing finish later (5-3) we finally extricated ourselves from the press and headed for lunch.

Next: Mo’ Chicken

[Dejah]

Been catching up on your travelogue. After the March 23 – Mountain Octopus entry, all I can say isSHOCK 'N' AWE!

[Peter Green]

March 24 – Post Game Syndrome

Following on the baseball debacle, we headed out in search of food. At least Jason and I did. Scud opted for a return to the apartment, and the food court next door.

Jason had a place he wanted to check out. This was a “chicken galbi” place with an outlet at Coex where he’d eaten. Their new location was a lot closer to home, and Jason wanted to give it a try, having enjoyed his prior meal. (The group’s website is www.miraekoreakig.co.kr if you want to check it out).

Unfortunately, here’s a case of a meal gone awry. It really is unfortunate, as Yoonhi is looking over my shoulder at the dishes they offer (like hemyongttakjjim and Andong jjimdak) and going “that looks really good”.

Inside, things did look very good. Sharp, slick, shiny extractor fans, very upscale. There’s just one thing missing…..

There were no burners.

It seems that we were here just too early. They’d done a soft opening, but without the burners installed. The waitress was very apologetic.

This meant that we were reliant upon the old fall-back, the gas canister hot plate. Not a good substitute for a full-on Korean bbq in terms of cooking power, and, frankly, I get a little nervous with one of those things ignited in front of me.

Meanwhile, another of Jason’s friends – T from Chicago – was in the neighborhood, so he joined us so we could make more out of the meal, and dissect the game.

Food was what I have written down as ddeok galbi…..yeah, that doesn’t work well as a name – rice cake ribs. But it was an attractive collection of vegetables, potato, chilies, mushrooms, cabbage, gaenip, and the usual evil red sauce that simmers in the plate. It looked more to me like ddeokbokki.

And, like our meal on Ddeokbokki Street last trip, we ordered stuff to add in. The first alien entry was a plate of prawns.

Our waitress happily stirred and stirred.

She stirred for a very long time, as the heat was nowhere near sufficient.

But finally, it was cooked, and we could start eating. By now we were hungry. We shredded up some fresh greens and tossed them on top for colour.

I wouldn’t complain about the flavour. I think our general discontent lay about the amount of time it took to cook. When you have the munchies, you don’t want to be waiting too long.

After eating our way through it for a bit, Jason called for some ramen to augment the deok. Yes, this was turning into another starch fest.

After about an hour or so, we were ready to finish off, so it came down to bokkumbap. Reasonably well executed, and a good finish, in case we hadn’t had quite enough starch yet.

Not bad, and the service was very pleasant. The lack of proper flame wasn’t the staff’s problem, and I should think that’s been corrected by now.

We were full, and the soju was sitting well on the beers from earlier. It looked like it was shaping up to be a quiet evening of watching TV and playing video games.

As a final note, we considered Butterfinger Pancakes, just nearby.

All I can say is, I hope they have clean floors.

Next: Bring Your Mother-In-Law

[Peter Green]

March 25 – Old Haunts

Scud spent his morning job-shadowing Jason over at the studio. Part of modern high school student life consists of gathering “life experience credits” in order to graduate.

When I was young, we just worked at restaurants for below minimum wage so we could have money to spend on food and comics.

They had wood-burning TVs back then, too.

With the two young ‘uns back home, we headed out for lunch. This was to be a reprise, mainly for Scud’s sake.

The mujinjangme-ungalbi onduljib charimsang – “The Incredibly spicy rib heated floor house prepared table.”

Yes, I brought Scud here for the name.

And the beef is good, too

Down the stairs again, kick off our shoes, and nestle up to the low tables.

I was trying to see if any of the notes had changed in the last 18 months. The TV anchors all looked the same.

It was the same drill as last time. One dish. Beef ribs in a hot stew. We went with hot. That’s hot enough. Last time we went as far as hot, and that was rough enough.

I’ll crib some of my text from the last visit, in case you didn’t want to hit that link back there:

” The meat had been marinated in the spice, and then partially cooked. The idea now was to bring everything together in the table-top boil – ribs, leeks, chilis, more chilis, still more chilis, and some potatoes that were submerged under there somewhere.”

The fish were a nice addition to the usual suspects on the banchan buffet. They’d been lightly fired with a bit of chili to perk them up. Nice long strips of maeulchi. (I’ve probably spelt that wrong, but Yoonhi’s not here).

And cole slaw. I wonder….do they serve cole slaw regularly at Korean restaurants in North America? I wonder what they’d say if I asked for some?

The kungnamul in broth was the same, though, and is the emergency switch for the heat in the meat here.

(Warning: if you’re going to eat a lot of pickled garlic during a meal, don’t plan on sleeping in the same room as someone else that night. I like garlic, but this crawls out of you later on).

As an “old haunt”, there have to be spirits about, so we were on the soju for lunch.

Oh, another word to the wise. If your son and nephew are out, don’t leave the purchase of transit tokens up to them.

He still has to pay for this. The little girl is bad enough, but that hair…….

It was an item on the menu I’d forgotten about. If you come here, and bring your mother-in-law, her meal is free.

I should’ve frizzed Scud’s hair and put him in stretch pants as retribution.

Aside: first thing to do in Korea is buy a transit token stoked with cash. This is your friend. After you buy this, you no longer suffer at ticket machines trying to decipher fares while people gnash their teeth behind you, nor do you tie up the human ticket booth, where you embarrass people with your lack of Korean. The busses take these, too, as do many of the taxis now. If you’re visiting Seoul, get one. Just don’t get this one (if you’re a guy).

Scud, as usual, was on Pepsi (it must be a Korean drink, as it has the Taeguk – yin yagn – on it…or something close, according to the film Attack the Gas Station.

The food was just as evil as last time, but Scud did us proud and didn’t resort to washing it off in the kungnamul like his mom did.

This dish is a good example of “Korean hot”. “Sneaky”, in contrast to the the Thai “slap you across the face” hot. At first you think “Eh, that’s not so bad.” But it keeps on building, and building, and building, until at the end you’re just relishing the pain.

Maybe that explains Park ChanWook’s films?

Next: Heaven is a Place

[Peter Green]

The photos of food in that restaurant are making me salivate! I'm surprised by how neat that alley is. Are alleys usually that neat in Seoul?

←

Sorry, Pan, I missed this somehow.

Yes, in this day and age, everything is tidy. Even the allyways.

Try and leave litter somewhere, and you'll probably be lynched. Korea follows the "good for the many" rule, and so we've seen so many things tidied up over that last two decades.

But, wait until we get to Club Night. Then we'll get messy.

[Peter Green]

Silk worm larvae!?  I'm not a fan, but my father, who was born in Nagano (aka Shinshu), would be delighted to find them in Korea!

Gragon's Beard, 16,384 strands!  Very intriguing! 

Did you actually have one of those taiyaki (bungeo in Korean?)?  Do they taste like Japanese taiyaki?

←

Hiroyuki! I missed you, too, somehow! I'm sorry.

Comparing tai-yaki to bung-eo is tough, as I have lmited data upon which to base a comparison.

In Japan, the only time I had them was at the temple fair in Kyoto at To-ji. Then they were already cooked, and suffered from the lack of napalmishness (which really should be a word). In Korea, I've been lucky to have them fresh from the griddle, but I've noticed in Korea that people generally line up and wait for them to be ready, and refuse anything already out of the waffle iron.

Note - some sake coming in a couple of more on-line-day's worth of posts! I'll need your help!

[Peter Green]

Interlude

Coming off of one meal, Jason was working the phones to set up the crowd for the next one.

It’s good to have a hobby.

Back home, with the prospect of a lazy afternoon ahead of us, we settle down to computers and television. The traditional Korean day-at-home.

I think Scud is getting a little too complacent in anticipating his father’s needs.

Next: General Mungbean

[Peter Green]

March 25 – General Mungbean

Evening had fallen across Seoul, and we were stirring again. Tonight was a night for the rustic, for the cultural, for the historic.

And that means makkeoli and dongdongju.

As mentioned, for dongdongju, you look for a university. It’s the rule.

And here, near to Seoul University’s new digs, we find almost the perfect incarnation of what a makkeolijib should look like.

“But what,” you say, “does this have to do with Donghak and Mungbeens?”

Ah, I’m glad you asked.

Approaching this place (which is no mean feat, as we ended up parking about a kilometer away, and this was all uphill), you are presented with a shrine to Jeon Bongjun – “General Mungbean”, leader of the Donghak Rebellions. forces in their doomed revolution against corruption and the encroachment of foreign forces, philosophies, and products.

(I use the term “doom” here, as their early successes ensured the fate they dreaded most).

A facet of the Donghak movement (which goes back further than Jeon Bongjun’s time) was the use of poetry and song to spread the ideology. And General Mungbean is known as well for his verse as for his martial powers.

(Yes, I am going somewhere with all of this)

Given all this, is this bar an icon for the college crowd, or what? Independence, rebellion, idealism, literacy, and binge drinking, all the attributes we associate with the heady days of our youth.

It gets even better.

Low tables, poetry panels on the ceiling, and lighting so dark that you’d develop a squint if you spent too much time in here.

With attribues like this, the place was packed.

And dirt floors. This place has cultivated the expectations of tradition to a “T”. Reed matting shuffles beneath you as you sit.

I’m impressed.

I could see myself in a setting like this, plotting the overthrow of corrupt official, installing the rule of the morally indignant, and drinking heavily!

There are probably a few things in there that won’t work well together……Still, this is the sort of atmosphere that the spirit thrives on.

There was a chain I recall, with an outlet in Kuala Lumpur (amongst other places), that focused on recreating scenes from The Water Margin. I know I’m switching countries here, but I feel a lot more like part of Song Jiang’s mob sitting here with the smell of reed matting and dirt in my nose, a solid wooden table to pound on, and the prospect of good, solid food. (Come to think of it, the 108 Heroes ended tragically as well, for all of their fighting the good fight).

The drink comes in bowls, crystals of ice floating in the thick fluid. Proper drink should be served in bowls with a ladle (I should try this with an Australian shiraz some time).

We started with a crowd of six, with more people joining in as we progressed. This is good, as it means that I, as the eldest (by a long way) never have to worry about pouring for myself.

Our first cheon was haemulcheon, with bits of octopus and squid worked in with the batter and kimchi. A dipping sauce of soy and vinegar, topped with toasted sesame seeds.

Then a pacheon (green onion). This is one of my favourite cheons, packed with spring onion, the batter just holding things together.

Nurungji was in the dongdongju here, too. You could smell that Rice Crispy aroma in there – muted by the temperature.

Food and drink. Lots of both.

Here’s another delight. Noodles to be mixed up fresh with chilis, vegetables, sesame, and little marinated snails from the rice paddies.

I like dishes like this. They give people a chance to demonstrate their motor skills under the influence of dongdongju. (Note: don’t bring a lot of white shirts to Korea).

And another fine dish it was. It’s hard to see the snails, but they gave a nice rubbery chew as you ate your way through this. (And, yes, it was hot)

Another architectural note – low ceilings. This way they can fit in two levels of seating. (We actually wanted to eat in an upper bunk, but they took a look at Scud and I, double checked their support beams, and told us to take a floor booth.)

I like eating in Korean bars. Pork. This was first steamed, and then fired up with chilies and green onion, liberally dashed with sesame.

(Scud did confide in me that he was tired of “everything coming out red”)

I could do a whole 12 month calendar with shots of dongdongju.

More people arrived (with a few choice words said about finding this place), and so we ordered more cheon, fire-red from the kim chi and (I suspect) gochugaru.

What a perfect place. That smell of soil in your nose, the creak of the upper floors, the reassuring chunk of your fist on solid wood, and the laughter of the young.

Or, at least “younger”.

This is the sort of place I can spend a lot of time in.

Next: A very late morning

[Peter Green]

I have a question now. Remember, these threads aren't intended to be a one-way street. I'm looking for feedback (and food).

This question is particularly for the Korea based crowd.

How is the production and distribution of dongdongju (and the good-quality makkeoli) handled?

Is there actually a factory for this stuff, or is it being done restaurant by restaurant?

Or is it one of those "micro-brew" items, where a distributed network of sites are producing traditional beverages?

This is really bothering me.

Plus, does anyone out there have a recipe for makkeoli or dongdongju?

(Can you tell that I'm going through withdrawals?)

[insomniac]

Peter am enjoying your one way street but with no answers, blame it on the moonlight, blame it on the boogie...(sorry)