Mild Sevens, the breakfast of champions. At least in Korea. As vauntingly expected, food has been a highly coveted item on my list of to-do's since coming to the Land of the Morning Calm. And, to that end, I'm going to spend a brief entry reminiscing about a few experiences not entirely different from stuffing my belly like 8-year old RE eating cake. On the third day, Joe and I wandered around Myeong Dong looking for random places to eat, until we stumbled upon Pascucci, the oddest yet trendiest coffee shop I've ever seen. In the entrance, a flat screen TV showed two girls taking off their shirts and seductively licking the foam off a cappucino. Joe and I paused, looked at each other, and without a moment's hesitation, headed upstairs to what quickly became the Ultimate Starbucks Killer.
Later in the day, and by later I mean an hour later, we ate lunch at this place called Omuto Tomato, a thriving chain restaurant that appeared to be as ubiquitous as the aforementioned caffeine dealer. Omuto Tomato, how could anyone turn down a lunch there with a name as mashiso-sounding (delicious) as that? They basically served omelettes with rice inside and ingredients ranging from tenderloin and mushrooms to shrimp and chili. If Shauna ate this, she'd say "It's so good" so many times we'd have to make her flail her arms to forget about it. And only then, she'd have to flail her arms until she collapsed in complete exhaustion. It was that good. Which made it difficult for us to keep on keep truckin' toward what we thought would be touristy sites. You see, for some odd reason, Joe and I decided to take our adventure on foot around Seoul, causing us to wander a good 5 miles in random nonsensical directions looking for one stinkin' palace. Well, we never found it. But we did find a huge mountain to accidentally hike. We drowned ourselves in martinis and whiskey as soon as we found our way home.
Ah, and again, the street vendors...the sarang (love) of my life here in Seoul. Hot, mouthwatering spices, layered over rice and fish cakes, accompanied by crispy potstickers and spice-infused soups. Almost every chance I got, I told Joe, "I want street vendor food. I want fish cake. I want dakbugi. I want this. I want that." As the best host/tour guide/translater/chingoo I could have on this trip, he'd always reply, "Sure, kaja (let's go)!" And, with every bite I had of this soul-soothing substance of life, I'd announce to the world, "MASHITA!!!"
Highlight! Yuni took us to a street vendor in Insadong, a touristy destination filled with tea cafes, souvinir shops, and cozy little restaurants, just located off a main street with tons of bars, booking clubs, and...Bennigan's. Yes, American chain restaurants have invaded Korea. Unfortunately, only the bad ones. No Ruth's Chris. No Roy's. Just Outback Steakhouse, Pizza Hut, and Burger King. wtf. Anyway, back to the fun chaps pictured to the right. These guys were Hilarious. They choreographed and rehearsed an elaborate presentation in which they showed us how to make honey-stringed candies, mixing English, Korean, and Japanese in unified exclamations of tourist-trapping excitement. They won my money. They won more of Joe's.
Dak. Chicken. And chap-chae. Noodles. So freakin' amazingly good that there's no way my drool did not land somewhere in this pot of steaming goodness. I apologized to my fellow table-dwellers. Yuni and her friend Boram took us to a popular restaurant that serves three menu items: Chicken. Seafood. Mystery. It was basically an amalgamation of meats, veggies, hot spicy goop, potatoes, peppers, and everything else that helps create ecstacy. As the meal wore on and as my mouth burned with spicy fire, I just kept eating and eating, a gluttonous experience rivaled only by Franconi and his hot dogs. It made me so happy I wanted to kick this robot in the nuts:
Mild Sevens, the breakfast of champions. At least in Korea. As vauntingly expected, food has been a highly coveted item on my list of to-do's since coming to the Land of the Morning Calm. And, to that end, I'm going to spend a brief entry reminiscing about a few experiences not entirely different from stuffing my belly like 8-year old RE eating cake. On the third day, Joe and I wandered around Myeong Dong looking for random places to eat, until we stumbled upon Pascucci, the oddest yet trendiest coffee shop I've ever seen. In the entrance, a flat screen TV showed two girls taking off their shirts and seductively licking the foam off a cappucino. Joe and I paused, looked at each other, and without a moment's hesitation, headed upstairs to what quickly became the Ultimate Starbucks Killer.
Later in the day, and by later I mean an hour later, we ate lunch at this place called Omuto Tomato, a thriving chain restaurant that appeared to be as ubiquitous as the aforementioned caffeine dealer. Omuto Tomato, how could anyone turn down a lunch there with a name as mashiso-sounding (delicious) as that? They basically served omelettes with rice inside and ingredients ranging from tenderloin and mushrooms to shrimp and chili. If Shauna ate this, she'd say "It's so good" so many times we'd have to make her flail her arms to forget about it. And only then, she'd have to flail her arms until she collapsed in complete exhaustion. It was that good. Which made it difficult for us to keep on keep truckin' toward what we thought would be touristy sites. You see, for some odd reason, Joe and I decided to take our adventure on foot around Seoul, causing us to wander a good 5 miles in random nonsensical directions looking for one stinkin' palace. Well, we never found it. But we did find a huge mountain to accidentally hike. We drowned ourselves in martinis and whiskey as soon as we found our way home.
Ah, and again, the street vendors...the sarang (love) of my life here in Seoul. Hot, mouthwatering spices, layered over rice and fish cakes, accompanied by crispy potstickers and spice-infused soups. Almost every chance I got, I told Joe, "I want street vendor food. I want fish cake. I want dakbugi. I want this. I want that." As the best host/tour guide/translater/chingoo I could have on this trip, he'd always reply, "Sure, kaja (let's go)!" And, with every bite I had of this soul-soothing substance of life, I'd announce to the world, "MASHITA!!!"
Highlight! Yuni took us to a street vendor in Insadong, a touristy destination filled with tea cafes, souvinir shops, and cozy little restaurants, just located off a main street with tons of bars, booking clubs, and...Bennigan's. Yes, American chain restaurants have invaded Korea. Unfortunately, only the bad ones. No Ruth's Chris. No Roy's. Just Outback Steakhouse, Pizza Hut, and Burger King. wtf. Anyway, back to the fun chaps pictured to the right. These guys were Hilarious. They choreographed and rehearsed an elaborate presentation in which they showed us how to make honey-stringed candies, mixing English, Korean, and Japanese in unified exclamations of tourist-trapping excitement. They won my money. They won more of Joe's.
Dak. Chicken. And chap-chae. Noodles. So freakin' amazingly good that there's no way my drool did not land somewhere in this pot of steaming goodness. I apologized to my fellow table-dwellers. Yuni and her friend Boram took us to a popular restaurant that serves three menu items: Chicken. Seafood. Mystery. It was basically an amalgamation of meats, veggies, hot spicy goop, potatoes, peppers, and everything else that helps create ecstacy. As the meal wore on and as my mouth burned with spicy fire, I just kept eating and eating, a gluttonous experience rivaled only by Franconi and his hot dogs. It made me so happy I wanted to kick this robot in the nuts:
err-or. err-or. err-orrrrr.......the end.
3 comments:
i'm totally going to leave a comment on every post. guess that means i have to go back to day 2.... hm.
anyway, i just wanted to share that i'm excited i finally get the robot reference. j.wu was quite appalled that i hadn't seen eurotrip yet (1. because it's a quality film... and 2. because scotty & i went to HS together (and no, he doesn't know)) so after invading your house for the RB, we left with a goodie. i'll take it back, don't worry.
glad you're eating your weight in good food + stephen drool... so dee-ri-cious.
i don't know what's going on with the pictures before the final foot-to-robot-groin...you look like something out of the ring...but i'm a big fan of the eurotrip reference.
Good blog dude.
-Tony C. Yang
No longer in Iraq, Calif.
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