Korean Food

Korean food as a whole was delicious. We loved the meat buffets the most.  Our eating adventures started with the plane ride as Korean cuisine was part of the menu. We didn't dare try any local Korean food our first night because we hadn't picked up Taz yet. Luckily, a Mc Donalds was right by our hotel and we ate there for dinner and breakfast the next morning. We tried a drink called Milkis which is carbonated milk. We both liked it. Our very first meat buffet Samgyeopsal, had two different kinds of meat and a boiling hot soup that Taz, Johnny and Oslo just slurped straight out of the pot! Our air BnB was right above a convenience store so we bought some Korean Ramen and had it for breakfast one morning.  Taz made the foil lid into a cone and used that as his bowl which is how the Koreans eat them.  We had dinner, Dak- galbi, one night with Shawn, an investigator Taz had been working with.  I remember that night because a song came on the sound system that I knew! It was a BTS song Fake Love and I said, hey I know this song and Shawn said yes it was BTS and Taz said oh, then I know BTS (he didn't really know them or so he thought).

We were on our own for lunch and Taz wanted us to try Sweet and Sour Pork (Tangsuyuk).  It was an actual side dish to this noodles with bean paste called Jjajangmyeon. It was delicious and one of my favorite dishes that we had.  After our trip to Gyeongbokgung Palace the members we went with took us to a Sushi buffet for dinner. It was good as it had sushi dishes made from beef and pork as well as fish. Taz and Garry tried a weird hairy fruit together. Nene chicken...need I say more. Taz talked a lot about it on his mission as it was a favorite of those elders. It was delicious and I'm sure totally unhealthy, but so good that we had it twice! We bought it on a Saturday because our Sunday dinner appointment cancelled and we knew it would hold up and feed us on Sunday so we wouldn't have to go buy food on the Sabbath.

One night, we went to a members house for dinner and they took us out to a restaurant. We had Banchan (Korean side dishes). It was so weird, they just kept bringing dishes and dishes of food.  I had Taz stand over the table and take a picture of this...the beginning...then they just kept bringing more and more food! They brought duck and it wasn't fish (they brought a lot of that too), so we opted to try it and it was so good! It was kind of like a cross between ham and corned beef, I wrapped it in a mudfish leaf of some kind and just ate away. They also served a purple rice which we loved and just above that you can see the pickled jelly fish.  Taz and I tried that and it was surprisingly good! The last photo was at the end when we had everything. You can see black pots in front of us. They cooked the rice in these and scorched it, then served us that purple rice from the center. Then they fill the pots with boiling water and you scrape the scorched rice off the sides and eat that as a dessert.  Lets just call this meal interesting!

The Koreans have fruit as a dessert. After every meal, they bring out the fruit. It was quite a pleasant way to end the meal.  One night we had Bae-Asian pears and the people gave us some to take home. Boy did we love those asian pears! Taz knew exactly how to cut them and we ate those for snacks over the course of our stay. We went to Lotte Mart a few times and one time we got Korean snacks. That green bag looked like Funyuns and Garry was craving something salty. We bought them, but they were coated in sugar not salt. He was not happy. We also have some scorched rice candy and Korea's version of Moon Pies and Taz's favorite treat, Digit, they remind me of Keebler Fudge Striped cookies but they are choc full of fiber and Taz said they kept him "regular" throughout his mission because it was his go to snack. They were delicious. We also have some Pppero, they are like Pockey, chocolate covered biscuit sticks and they have several different kinds. We got the chocolate almond covered ones. They actually have a national Pepero day 11/11. While the exact origins of Pepero Day are unknown, they are usually traced back to a 1983 tale of two female middle school students sharing a box of Peperos in hopes of becoming tall and thin. The two girls reportedly claimed that eating Pepero sticks on Nov. 11 at 11:11 A.M in exactly 11 seconds would make a person tall and slender, sparking a fad among schoolgirls in the Yongnam Area and skyrocketing sales.
Many South Koreans, however, are skeptical of this story and argue that the holiday date originated due to the snack’s shape resembling 1’s. Others claim that Lotte, the manufacturer of Pepero, invented the holiday as a marketing tool, but the confectionary company has repeatedly denied this allegation. Taz says it is for single men and they are supposed to buy themselves a Pepero and eat it on that day.  Now however it has become a holiday similar to Valentines day here where you exchange Peperos with family, friends and lovers.  Whatever the origin, they are delicious. Taz was wanting us to try Korean ice cream. We were walking around one day and he said, lets go to an ice cream store, now I was thinking a place like Cold Stone, but no! This place had little freezers full of different kinds of ice cream like you'd buy at 7-11. I had a digi cone which was chocolate covered strawberries in a cone. Garry had Pistachio flavored Bravo cone and Taz had Tank boy which is Korean pear flavored. We also got "ice cream" at the CU store under our house. We tried another carbonated drink called coco balm. It was good, but had chunks of something in it...like those bubble things you get in boba tea.

We had another traditional 5 course Korean meal with two of Taz's friends. This one had way more fish, so we were limited in what we ate, but we did love the glass noodles. We sure loved Tangsuyuk which is a breaded pork cutlet. We had this a few times and this particular one was covered in cheese. I also had one a different time that had a gravy over it. Loved them both! They had several sea food joints all over and the "food" was kept outside the restaurant live. Octopus and eels were very prominent.

We did enjoy the Korean desserts. They had 32 cm cones on a popular busy street that we tried and wapple which was a waffle filled with ice cream and whip cream. We also tried hotteok which is a filled pancake. It was filled with brown sugar, honey, nuts and cinnamon and just a regular wapple for Garry. We also tried a Korean hot dog which is a corn dog in America. We got a regular one and a cheese filled one. After they are cooked they ask you if you want the secret coating, we said yes and they rolled it in the coating...turns out it's sugar! Arg, they like sweet with savory. It was pretty good, but weird too. And we tried fruit juice, the elders particularly enjoyed these and they are very similar to smoothies. And of course Bingsu which I already talked about in a previous post. And Garry finally got his salty when we ordered this potatoe on a stick. It screamed American food and was quite tasty.

We loved bulgogi in any form! This was Bulgogi bibimbap...so, so yummy.  We also went to tteokbokki place which features rice cake noodles of all shapes and varieties and you make a soup out of it.  Taz loved them, but after awhile they were a little too much for me and it was low on the totem pole of favorite foods. We did all enjoy Samgyetang which is a Korean chicken ginseng soup. It comes with a whole chicken in it and it was refreshing and delicious. Another favorite of the elders was a food place called Mom's Touch. Taz especially loved the Dip cheeseburger which was smothered in nacho cheese sauce. So we tried that.  Delicious.

But if we could have our our way, we'd eat those meat buffets every night, and we almost did.  One night we took a former companion of Taz's Elder Tippets and his new comp out to one. This was a Galbi buffet...YUMMY! And our very last night in Korea we had Moksal and Samgyupsal BBQ. They are all delicious and never disappoint. As much as I enjoyed eating the Korean food, I have to admit, it was nice to return home and back to our normal food. We have found a good Korean BBQ place here that we enjoy and are on the hunt for more Korean places. It will be nice to enjoy them every once in awhile. It was truly a fun foody experience though!