Caveat: Lentil Chili

I made lentil chili. I ate some. [broken link! FIXME] Chili 002

I've been reading Milton's Paradise Lost. Hard slogging. Can you believe, I never read it before? It was always a hole in my literary foundations.

 

 

What I'm listening to right now.

Absurd Minds, "Deception."

Caveat: Ya es muy tarde

[broken link! FIXME] Cb 002I made curried broccoli, using some Thai green curry paste and spices and onions and coconut milk.

Después, lo comí.

 

 

 

 

 

What I'm listening to right now.

Pastilla, "Colores." La letra:

Ya es muy tarde
No es tan tarde
Espera un poco
Espera un ratito
Dame tu mano
Nada importa
Etamos solos
Yetás mojada.
(coro)
Cuando todo es de color
El azul es el mejor
Cuando quieras descubrir
Y tu piel quieras abrir
Cuando todo te va mal
Piensa solo en mi voz
Toma una navaja
Y córtate las venas.
Por la mañana
Abres los ojos…
Y te levantas
Te tomas un baño
Llama un taxi
Hacia el estudio
Todos te esperan
Yestan enojados
(coro).

Caveat: Spirit Wrestlers

[broken link! FIXME] Beets 001I finally ran across some beets during my most recent visit to the Orangemart supermarket across the street. Grace had told me that they had them, but I had never managed to see them until this time. Maybe it's a kind of sometimes thing.

I love beets. And beets make me think of borshch (or borsht or borscht, Борщ). So I made borshch. I didn't follow a recipe. I'd been reading a while back about a way of making it where you oven-roast the beets and potatoes first, to carmelize them slightly and give them a stronger flavor. I don't have an oven – I don't even have a microwave – but I was trying to think of ways to achieve a similar carmelizing effect.

Here's the recipe I made up as I went, with occasional illustrations.

[broken link! FIXME] Beets 002I peeled and cut up one large beet into thin bite-sized slices. I did the same to one carrot and two smallish potatoes. This seemed about right for one "batch" which I imagine will be three servings for me.

[broken link! FIXME] Beets 003I sliced two small white onions and added a few cloves of crushed garlic to a pot and began to fry them in about a tablespoon of canola oil (I have a several-years' supply of canola oil, as several bottles came embedded in my Seollal gift-set from my boss this year). I added the chopped beets, carrots and potatoes, and some spices. I used ground bay leaf, thyme, oregano, dill seed, a dash of salt, black pepper, a squirt of lemon juice, a teaspoon of brown sugar (to bring out that carmelized beet and onion flavor, right?).

[broken link! FIXME] Beets 004Then, I "stir fried" it all on a low flame. I didn't add any additional liquid. I figured when it started to burn, I would add the liquid, but I wanted to try to get the carmelizing effect. And much to my surprise, it didn't start to burn, for almost 30 minutes. The onions and beets and the lemon juice seemed to provide enough liquid to prevent the stuff from sticking to the pan. I stirred it a lot.

[broken link! FIXME] Beets 006The stuff cooked down a lot. It bubbled and smelled delicious.

Finally there was some crusting on the bottom of the pot, so I added a half cup of red wine (which I keep for cooking and use when recipes call for vinegar). Then I added a cup of tomato juice – which is a great instant, convenient vegan substitute for any recipe that calls for broth or soup stock. This bubbled up and boiled I periodically added some additional water, for another 30 minutes.

The recipe is purely vegan up to this point.

[broken link! FIXME] Beets 009I broke that rule because I put a pat of butter on it and sprinkled some dried thyme, for serving it. I didn't have any sour cream or yogurt on hand, which is what you're supposed to put on borshch.

Borshch always makes me think of Doukhobors. Doukhobors are like slavic Quakers (and there's an important link to Tolstoy). I like Doukhobors. If I had to be a Christian, I would have to be a Doukhobor, maybe. The name means "Spirit Wrestlers."

The personal connection, for me, was in the summer of 1989 when I made a road trip with my brother and father in the moonwagon (my dad's 1949 Chevy suburban) from Minnesota to the Kootenays region of British Columbia. My father spent some time during his childhood there, in a Quaker semi-utopianist community named Argenta, that was linked to the one his parents had founded in Southern California. There are a lot Doukhobors in that part of Canada, and we visited someone who served us home-made Doukhobor borshch, which is one the most delicious meals I have ever eaten in my life, perhaps in part the context, but truly good food, too. Ever since, I keep trying to reproduce that experience, which is why I so [broken link! FIXME] frequently obsess on borshch-making.

And as a stunning non-sequitur, I offer: what I'm listening to right now.

Mexican Institute of Sound, "Yo digo baila." Y además:

Mexican Institute of Sound, "El micrófono." Que chango tan chistoso, ´nel video.

Mejitecno. Jeje.

There is really nothing quite like sitting in a cozy apartment on a frigid February day, in Northwest South Korea, eating homemade borscht and listening to Mexican techno.

Spirit wrestling.

Caveat: Pea Soup

What's with me and [broken link! FIXME] pea soup? If you look around this blog, you'd think it was the main thing I cook. It's not. It's just the main thing I cook and then blog about having cooked, I guess. Maybe I just really like the pea soup I make for myself?

I made pea soup last night. It's good on cold days. It feels nutritious and healthy to eat. This time I added dill spice (because I have a lifetime supply) and carrots and celery (the things added depend in part on what I run across in the produce aisle across the street – those wacky "foreign" veggies [i.e. celery] aren't consistently available).

My friend Seungbae called last night – one of my "Gwangju friends" whom I haven't visited because I'm too lazy to travel to Gwangju. And it turns out he's being tranferred by his work to the south side of Jeju Island – the Korean equivalent of being transferred to… hm, maybe Bakersfield (nice climate, but backwater town). Now it's even less likely I'll visit him, I suppose.

Caveat: 바지락

바지락 [ba-ji-rak] is a small clam. Koreans love seafood, and I've been getting adventurous with the instant-foods aisle in the supermarket (see e.g. [broken link! FIXME] my recent post on nurungji). So I bought some ramen-looking stuff (that also claims to be lo-calorie and not fried – "notfrying" in English on the label) that was called 바지락. Last night, when I opened the package, I was surprised to find some actual vacuum-packed clams! And it cooked up pretty delicious.

Here's a tear-down (i.e. pictures).

[broken link! FIXME] Clam 005 [broken link! FIXME] Clam 007

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I'm not going to make any assertions or assumptions about healthfulness – I'm sure it's packed with preservatives and MSG and who knows what else. But it was nevertheless pretty tasty. [broken link! FIXME] Clam 011

Caveat: Corn

I made home-made tortillas again today, using the masa harina my mom mailed me from Australia – I like  that masa basically keeps forever in a well-sealed container. Unlike most "foreign foods," Mexican-style masa harina isn't to be found in even the most obscure Korean specialty store, because of two contradictory facts: a) there's no market for corn flour, and b) masa harina is viewed by the government as nothing different than corn-meal (which is easily found), but corn-meal is a "raw food product" and therefore require a domestic manufacturer – which would require a market see a).

Anyway,  made-in-the-USA masa harina can be bought in Queensland, Australia, food stores, and so my mother mailed me some after I visited her last year (it was about one year ago this week, in fact).

I press the tortillas flat with a plate, using some ziploc baggies as a non-stick surface. Then I cook them in a heated frying pan with no oil. They're pure corn flour. Much healthier than store-bought ones.

It's possible to buy frozen, US store-style tortillas in places like Costco, here, but I really don't like those. Fresh, warm, home-made tortillas are awesome. I can't make folded tortillas (i.e. tacos) with them, because, being hand-pressed, they're a little too fat and brittle for that. Actually, they're almost more like Central American pupusas. I put cheese or beans or rice or mushrooms on them. They're delicious.

[broken link! FIXME] Corn 002

Caveat: 옛날 구수한 누룽지

Food 001I wrote [broken link! FIXME] once before about the Korean flavor called “누룽지” [nu-rung-ji = scorched rice] It was a time when I went through a short-time obsession with scorched-rice-flavored candy. Recently, I was wandering the aisles of my neighborhood supermarket, and beheld the product shown in the photo at right: “옛날 구수한 누룽지” (yet-nal gu-su-han nu-rung-ji = “old time savory scorched rice”]. It was on the same shelf as the multitudes of instant soups and ramens, so I adduced it was an instant product in the just-add-hot-water variety.
In the time since having scorched-rice candy, a little over a year ago, I have also had the experience of having “real” nurungji. Here’s how it works. Cooked rice is often served in heated stone or ceramic bowls – sufficiently heated that it burns onto the sides and bottom of the containers. This is “scorched rice.” Once you’ve managed to eat all the rice out of the heated bowl, you pour boiling water into the bowl and use a spoon to scrape and stir everything around unsticking the scorched rice from the bottom and sides of the bowl. Rather than throw this away (as might be done in the US), this soupy substance eaten as a delicacy.
I guess the flavor grows on you. It’s kind of porridgy. And I’ve always liked porridges of various sorts. I like that it’s sufficiently esteemed in Korea to have turned into an instant food. I bought some, and had it, and it’s grown on me. Little packets of dried out, pre-cooked, scorched rice. You add hot water, and it’s a delicious snack.
Reading the ingredients, it consists of nothing but rice (product of Korea!) and salt (not over-salted, either). I’ve bought this product several times, now. I eat it just as you might eat a bowl of hot oatmeal. Sometimes I Americanize it into a true breakfast-style porridge, by adding butter or brown sugar (I’m sure this would utterly horrify Koreans). Other times I have it with a side of kimchi and drink oksususuyeomcha (corn-tassle tea), more Korean-style. 
Welcome to the world of Korean comfort-food.

Caveat: In the backroads by the rivers of my memory

[broken link! FIXME] Div_fruitHappy Xmas.

I wrote some poetry. I'm not going to post it. Deal with it.

I pan-roasted an almost-perfect yellow bell-pepper (which Koreans call 파프리카 [paprika], after the German) and made a "from-scratch" vegan vegetable/marinara sauce, which I served over rice for my xmas dinner. I ate it with a cup of red wine – an 8 dollar bottle of Chilean shiraz that was on sale at the supermarket across the street in the basement of  the 태영프라자. It was good.

What I'm listening to right now.

Glen Campbell, "Gentle on My Mind." Haha. Country music. I don't listen to much of it, but I always liked this rendition by Glen Campbell.

The lyrics.

Gentle on My Mind

It's knowing that your door is always open and your path is free to walk
That makes me tend to leave my sleeping bag rolled up and stashed behind your couch
And it's knowing I'm not shackled by forgotten words and bonds
And the ink stains that have dried upon some line
That keeps you in the backroads by the rivers of my mem'ry
That keeps you ever gentle on my mind

It's not clinging to the rocks and ivy planted on their columns now that bind me
Or something that somebody said because they thought we fit together walking
It's just knowing that the world will not be cursing or forgiving
When I walk along some railroad track and find
That you're moving on the backroads by the rivers of my mem'ry
And for hours you're just gentle on my mind

Though the wheat fields and the clotheslines
And the junkyards and the highways come between us
And some other woman's crying to her mother cause she turned and I was gone
I still might run in silence, tears of joy might stain my face
And the summer sun might burn me till I'm blind
But not to where I cannot see you walking on the backroads
By the rivers flowing gentle on my mind

I dip my cup of of soup back from a gurgling, crackling cauldron in some train yard
My beard a roughened coal pile and a dirty hat pulled low across my face
Through cupped hands round a tin can I pretend to hold you to my breast and find
That you're wavin' from the backroads by the rivers of my mem'ry
Ever smiling, ever gentle on my mind

Caveat: When the clean up is easy…

I have a new theory about how to know when what you've cooked is healthy. When the clean up from something you've made is so easy you can almost get away with not using soap, it means what you made is probably pretty healthy. There aren't any fats or sugars or burnt carbs to make it unhealthy, maybe.

I made a kind of mushroom, pepper, onion and tomato sauce and added rice –  I guess it's vaguely what some Americans call Spanish Rice. It was delicious.

I  talked to my mom, my uncle, my sister, my nephews on skype this morning. I don't like using skype… I'm not sure why. The call got dropped 3 times in less than an hour. Not reliable.

I've been feeling guilty about how little and how ineffectively I communicate with my family, which of course leads me to put off communicating with them. Vicious circle. I've retreated into a rather hermetic existence, lately. I'm not even unhappy with it. But I'm carrying an awareness that I'm sort of leaving people behind, not staying in touch with them… dropping long-maintained threads of communication and community.

I'm not content, I guess. A bit cut loose, existentially, by my terminal frustration with what had been the two chiefest, most important goals of my current life – learning Korean and becoming a better teacher. Neither are moving forward. They are simply … there. Static, unhappening projects.

What I'm listening to right now.

William Shatner (with Lemon Jelly), "Together." Really.

No kidding? Who'd have thought that William Shatner, even collaboration, could do something so… earwormy?

Caveat: 자몽


자몽 001I found, in my local supermarket, for the first time ever, grapefruit.  From California.  Labelled as 자몽 [ja-mong], which I think is a Korean neologism for grapefruit – the dictionary gives the Konglishy 그레이프프루트 [geureipeupeuruteu].  In the dictionary, 자몽 is given as meaning citron, which is a different kind of citrus altogether.  But regardless, this is the first time I’ve ever seen grapefruit in the produce aisle anywhere in Korea.  I bought some – because I love grapefruit.  So much for living on local food, low carbon footprint, right?

I made some pasta with tomatoes, mushrooms, onions and garlic, and had dinner.  And I cut sections of grapefruit and ate them as dessert.  Kind of a boring life I have, I know.
I was watching this Korean drama, but the sites I habitually use to download English subtitled versions of the dramas are rapidly disappearing – the copyright police seem to be active.  So I was left hanging, unable to watch the rest of the series.  I’m annoyed by this – the pay site that had subtitles was so horrible (streaming at very low speeds and quality such that the shows were essentially impossible to watch) I quit my membership.  If anyone reading this has advice on where to find subtitled Korean TV materials, please, please help me.
Saturday night my friend Basil was visiting up from Gwangju, where he now works, and we went to that Russian place he introduced me to.  I had borsht and svekolny (beet/garlic salad).  It was really good.  I wonder where one can find beets in Korea?  I want to make my own borsht, but borsht without beets is sacrilegious.  I bought some brown rye bread from the Russian bakery in the same neighborhood there – the clerk speaking Russian and me speaking Korean, and sort of communicating – and I had some of that, toasted, as breakfast.

Caveat: refrigerator triage and other banalities

Yesterday was a long day at work.  It's the time of month when we have to post grades and comments about students into the giant, macro-infested spreadsheet that serves as the hagwon student database system.  Actually, the spreadsheet's not bad for an ad hoc job – I've sometimes admired its low-budget ingenuity.  Anyway, at least I felt competent to do this job:  it's a good feeling of accomplishment when you can write personalized comments about 80 students and remember each of their faces and personalities.

Earlier in the day, I'd come in earlier than usual because I have my current "frontloaded" schedule that is all-elementary.  I'm putting a lot of work on my "little ones" – mostly first-graders that have felt kind of challenging lately, walking the fine line between being entertaining for the students and parental expectations that they will come home acting as if they were learning something.  Putting together a scheme for phonics flashcards (spelling simple words like cat and cake), I want to implement some kind of regular mini-quiz that's not too painful for the students but that give me a sense of whether or not they're making any progress.

I came home and faced the leftovers in my fridge.  I like to cook, as I've said, but cooking alone always leads to leftovers, and having such a small fridge (it's essentially what would be called a "dorm room" fridge in the US) means I have to get brutal and triage my leftovers pretty regularly – I end up throwing away things that don't get eaten far too often, and that induces feelings of guilt, which leads to me cooking less, which leads to me feeling annoyed with my diet.

[broken link! FIXME] Um 001 Um.  What was I saying?  I found some beans in my fridge and finished them off, after heating them up for an extra-extended period because I was worrying they might have something growing in them.  They tasted good.  And I woke up this morning.

Over the weekend I had made a tasty curry-coleslaw (see picture), using some end-of-its-natural-life cabbage and the infinite supply of gift-apples-in-a-box that I received as a Chuseok gift from my employer (see other picture – note standard-issue excessive packaging).

[broken link! FIXME] Day 002 That coleslaw is keeping well, so far.  But I had to throw out some rice and broccoli and mushrooms into the compost bin downstairs.  Isn't it cool, by the way, that big-city apartments in Ilsan give residents the opportunity to segregate their organic garbage?  Not that I have huge amount of faith that anything useful is being done with it… it might be being mixed in with the regular garbage at the landfill, as happens so often in the US, for example.  But one might be pleasantly surprised – Koreans seem predisposed, in some ways (e.g. by the density of their society, and its historically recent extreme poverty), to creating a more sustainable version of consumerism.

Caveat: Mixed-Grain Rice Pilaf, Garlic-Rosemary Red Beans, Curried Apple-Onion Chutney

[broken link! FIXME] Foody 002 It being Saturday, I got home from work relatively early.  I had been feeling motivated to go do some shopping, but when I stopped by the bank to get cash, I discovered that my ATM card had expired.  I guess that's one of those signs that I've been in Korea a long time.  I need to go by the bank and get a new card.

So, being low on cash, I did a minor grocery run in the GS Mart instead, and came home.

I had this big pile of apples that have been getting older. As in, beginning to get soft and brown-spotted. Obviously, I'm not eating them fast enough. Feeling some minor inspiration, I decided to make some curried apple-onion chutney.  It turned out to be one of those random, no-recipe-in-sight culinary experiments that was utterly successful. I try to keep wine around for cooking even though I don't drink much alcohol, and I had this intriguing bottle of Korean chardonnay (Korean!), called Mujuang (see picture).  I heated the chutney in that, with some lemon juice and lots of spices (tumeric, cumin, clove, cinnamon, red pepper flakes, etc. – a homemade curry powder), just long enough to make the apples and onions tender and to blend in the spices, and then I let it cool.

Then I took some of my already-cooked dark red beans that I keep in fridge (I have no idea what variety they are, in western parlance – they're just a kind of generic Korean dark red beans, which I cook in a large batch in my rice cooker and keep in a tupperware in the fridge) and I heated them up with a dash of sesame oil, with rosemary and garlic.  I scooped some rice out of my cooker into a little pilaf-thingy.  I always cook my rice with some 혼합곡 [honhapgok = "medley" (a fifteen-grain medley)] mixed in, about 2 parts rice to 1 part grain medley, to give it more texture and flavor, and that lends it a purplish color.

Here is a picture of my dinner.

[broken link! FIXME] Foody 003

It was a creative and tasty meal – its flavors and textures reminded me a lot of the vegan, Indian-cuisine themed restaurant I used to frequent when I lived in Mexico City in the 1980's, which is still one of my favorite restaurants of all time.

Caveat: onion rings with makgeolli batter

I sometimes get very experimental with cooking.  Maybe too experimental for my own good.

When I visited my mom in January, I had discussed with her a dilemma I sometimes have had:  I love cooking her recipe of chiles rellenos, but the egg-dense batter in which the chiles are coated is hard to substitute with something that would please my vegan friends.

I'm not vegan, myself, but I have in the past worked hard to come up with ways to make much of my cooking vegan, for three reasons:  1) I feel it makes it very healthy, 2) because I have a some friends who are vegan, and 3) just for the challenge of it.

Well, my mom had a brainstorm:  beer batter.  And I thought about this, and thought it was a wonderfully good idea.  And so I filed it away in my brain.  But I also had had a strange idea, at the time, about my life in Korea, and the various substitutions that happen in attempting non-Korean cooking in Korea.  Now… it must be said, beer is not hard to to find in Korea.  It's hardly the sort of thing that requires a substitution.  That's not an issue.  But I nevertheless had a thought – could I make an even more "native" beer-type batter, in Korea?  Specfically, I speculated on whether Korean makgeolli could be substituted for western-style beer. 

Makgeolli is beery, in character.  It's often called Korean rice wine, but it's more like beer (or maybe Mexican pulque) than it is like what I think of as rice wine, such as Japanese sake.  It's cloudy, and it has a slight carbonation to it.  This is the property that made me think it might be substituted for beer in beer batter.

Tonight, I went to the grocery store.  And I was staring at a refrigerator case, having just grabbed a bag of cheap packaged kimchi.  There was a bottle of makgeolli.  I remembered my idea, and, feeling inspired, or bored, or something, I bought it.

I came home.  I got out some wheat flour, and mixed in some black pepper, nutmeg and salt and a tablespoon of my mexican masa flour for some corny flavoring.  And then I dumped in some makgeolli, and stirred it up.  Voila.  Korean makgeolli batter.  Hmm…. it seemed a lot like beer batter, sure enough.

Now, for something to fry.  I saw my onions.  Hah.  Onion rings.

I made onion rings in makgeolli batter.  Has this ever been done before?  I don't know.

I won't say they were perfectly delicious.  But this was a first draft.  The oil I fried them in should have been a ligther variety of oil – maybe canola oil.  And the batter needed more salt.   But for a first draft, they were hardly horrible.  I felt pleased with my experiment.   Here is my plate of home-made makgeolli-batter-fried onion rings.

[broken link! FIXME] Rings 004

Note that the squarish item on the part of the plate closest to the camera is a block of colby cheese (imported from America, which I bought at Emart in Gwangju yesterday) that I'd used because I had a tiny bit of batter left over.  That was, in fact, pretty tasty, too.

Caveat: 40) 내 코로 맡은 냄새만 옳다고 생각한 어리석음을 참회하며 절합니다

“I bow in repentance of all the stupidity that I believe by only following the smells my nose finds.”
This is #40 out of a series of [broken link! FIXME] 108 daily Buddhist affirmations that I am attempting to translate with my hands tied behind my back (well not really that, but I’m deliberately not seeking out translations on the internet, using only dictionary and grammar).


38. [broken link! FIXME] 내 눈으로 본 것만 옳다고 생각한 어리석음을 참회하며 절합니다.
        “I bow in repentance of all the stupidity that I believe in my own eyes to be right.”
39. [broken link! FIXME] 내 귀로들은 것만 옳다고 생각한 어리석음을 참회하며 절합니다.
        “I bow in repentance of all the stupidity that I believe by my own ears to be right.”
40. 내 코로 맡은 냄새만 옳다고 생각한 어리석음을 참회하며 절합니다.

I would read this fortieth affirmation as:  “I bow in repentance of all the stupidity that I believe by only following the smells my nose finds.”
… but… but… those homemade tortillas I made yesterday with my illegally imported, well-traveled Mexican corn masa (manufactured in Texas, bought in an imported food shop in Queensland) smelled so delicious!
Masa 003
I made a cheese quesadilla.  The Korean processed sliced cheese wasn’t that good – kind of decadent – but the corn-tasting tortillas were excellent.
Masa 004

Caveat: Eating Well

I fly back out of Cairns, this morning. 

Because it's a fairly early flight, rather than leave my mom's at an ungodly early hour, we drove to her friend Pat's and stayed there last night, in Kuranda.  Kuranda is maybe my personally favorite place in the broader Cairns/Tableland region of Far North Queensland – it's up on the mountainside, but definitely within the tropical rainforest – very green and beautiful.  It reminds me of parts of Veracruz state, in Mexico, including my most favorite Mexican city, Xalapa. 

I've been eating very well, these days.  Too well.  Several times, my mother served me "chile verde" and bean burritos.  Her "chile verde" is quite famous – it is what is commonly called puerco pibil in Mexican restaurants in the states – it's a slow-cooked pork in spicy green chile sauce.  Thursday night, she made chiles rellenos – traditionally these are chiles poblanos (but her recipe, which I love, uses pickled Anaheim chiles) stuffed with cheese and fried in egg batter, with a tomato/onion/garlic/chile sauce.  Those are the most delicious things.  Friday, I made my recently innovated curried dhal, with split lentils, curry spices, onion, carrots, etc., over rice, and with some yoghurt on the side with cucumber, mint and onion.  Then last night, at Pat's, we had some fish in coconut broth with lemon grass (kind of a Thai type thing, it seemed), with roast chicken and stir-fried vegetables with rice, and an amazing baked peach custard for dessert.   It's been like eating restaurant food each night, but all home made. 

I guess the perennial diet will have to resume when I get back to Korea.  I'm not sticking to it too well, during these travels.

Caveat: el regalo de su color fogoso

[broken link! FIXME] Tomate Oda al tomate

La calle
se llenó de tomates,
mediodia,
verano,
la luz
se parte
en dos
mitades
de tomate,
corre
por las calles
el jugo.
En diciembre
se desata
el tomate,
invade
las cocinas,
entra por los almuerzos,
se sienta
reposado
en los aparadores,
entre los vasos,
las matequilleras,
los saleros azules.
Tiene
luz propia,
majestad benigna.
Devemos, por desgracia,
asesinarlo:
se hunde
el cuchillo
en su pulpa viviente,
es una roja
viscera,
un sol
fresco,
profundo,
inagotable,
llena las ensaladas
de Chile,
se casa alegremente
con la clara cebolla,
y para celebrarlo
se deja
caer
aceite,
hijo
esencial del olivo,
sobre sus hemisferios entreabiertos,
agrega
la pimienta
su fragancia,
la sal su magnetismo:
son las bodas
del día
el perejil
levanta
banderines,
las papas
hierven vigorosamente,
el asado
golpea
con su aroma
en la puerta,
es hora!
vamos!
y sobre
la mesa, en la cintura
del verano,
el tomate,
aastro de tierra,
estrella
repetida
y fecunda,
nos muestra
sus circunvoluciones,
sus canales,
la insigne plenitud
y la abundancia
sin hueso,
sin coraza,
sin escamas ni espinas,
nos entrega
el regalo
de su color fogoso
y la totalidad de su frescura.

– Pablo Neruda.

En México, su país de orígen, se lo dice jitomate, palabra azteca.  Es la fruta perfecta, en mi opinión.   En Corea, es fácil encontrar tomates locales de invernadero en cualquier mes del calendario, y aunque no son muy buenos, son mejores que los muy bien "viajados" (digamos californianos o mexicanos o chilenos) que suelen encontrar en gringolandia en época de invierno. 

Caveat: northbound potatoes v southbound potatoes

When I traveled to Seoul last weekend, I took the bus.  The Honam line buses all seem to stop at a single paired set of service areas along the tollway just south of Daejeon, called the Jeongan service areas.  (Honam is an old word that refers to the geographical southwest of the Korean peninsula, including the modern provinces of Jeollanam and Jeollabuk).

When I travel, I like to buy junk food at the service areas – I see travelling as an opportunity to not be so strict about what I eat, maybe.  I like to get 통감자 and 찹쌀도너츠 [tong-gam-ja = "potato bucket" (delicious roast potatoes) and chap-ssal-do-neo-cheu = "glutinous rice donuts" (chewy deep-fried balls of sweet rice dough)]. 

Well, it turns out that the northbound potato bucket is profoundly less satisfying and delicious than the southbound potato bucket.  And the portion sizes of the donuts are much bigger on the southbound side, too.  So I have to say, travelling south is better than travelling north, on the Honam line.  At least it is for me.

Here is my southbound snack, on Sunday.

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Here is a random picture out of the bus.

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Caveat: Scorched Rice, Looming Relocation

Sometimes, when I'm at the grocery store, I will buy something that I don't really know what it is, just because I'm curious to find out.  There are so many packaged snacks and candies in Korea that fall into the "I don't really know what that is" category.  Monday, I was in the candy aisle looking for some candy to buy for our "English Store" to sell to our students, and I saw something that was called "누룽 지향 사탕" – I still have no idea what this name means, since except for the last word, which means "candy," the dictionaries and googletranslators are unenlightening.  But under this name, in small letters, I found the descriptor "Scorched Rice Candy."  This sounded intriguing.  It's hard to think of "scorched rice" as being delicious.  Or as being candy.  But it sounded very Korean.  I bought a bag of Scorched Rice Candy.  It's not bad.  It really does taste like overcooked rice.  But of course, it's mostly sugar, which makes it candy.  I wonder if there's some kind of "comfort food" psychology behind a flavor like "scorched rice," in Korea.

I found out yesterday that the rumors circulating that I would have to move, again, were true.  That will be my fourth apartment since starting work at this school.  I'm not thrilled.  It's difficult for me not to feel a lot of anger and frustration over this aspect of my employment.  It definitely underscores why, no matter how much I like some aspects of Hongnong Elementary, I could never find myself renewing.  This is not to say that I don't recognize that other schools don't put their teachers through similar crap – it will be a gamble, wherever I choose to go next, and I realize that I could end up "losing out" and going somewhere with even worse problems.  My efforts to locate a school "ahead of time" where I might feel out what the job and living situations are like have come to nought.

The move date will be in February.  I wonder how complicated it will be?  I wonder how much extra of my own money it will end up costing me?  I expect I'll find out these answers on the day of the move – certainly not ahead of time.  Sigh.

 

Caveat: Why I’m Not Vegan

I should be vegan. But I'm not vegan.

At core, I am entirely sympathetic with both the ethical and health-based arguments in favor of a vegan diet.

RE Ethics:
I'm not even thinking in terms of the animal-cruelty / infliction-of-suffering issues. Those are concerning, but for me, they don't really offer a compelling case in and of themselves, because I suspect that, in the broader scheme of things, suffering on the part of individuals is inevitable – it's a part of existence. Do animals raised for food suffer more than animals in the wild? Yes, certainly, many times – especially in factory farming that is so common nowadays.  But animals suffer more in nature, too, sometimes. If we pursue this ethic to it's logical end point, we end up banning carnivorism from nature, and throwing tigers or eagles in prison.   Silly.

No, for me, the ethical argument is about sustainability, carbon-footprint, environmental impact. I'm one of those who believes the eliminating meat from the human diet would probably have more impact on global CO2 emissions than eliminating the automobile. Seriously – this is very likely true. If we want to have an environmentally sustainable future, we must, as a species, move toward a sustainable diet, and such a diet really can't include meat for 6~7 billion plus humans.

RE Health:
When I was losing my 60+ pounds (25 kilos) in 2006~2007, I did so, mostly, while consuming a vegan diet. I felt healthier, and it was much easier to keep within the calorie rules I'd set for myself. But several things favored that approach, at that time, including leading an almost entirely solitary lifestyle (not going out with friends, not having an out-of-home job e.g. I was working from home, etc) and living across the street from a very well-stocked and progressive grocery store (the Lunds in Minnapolis's Uptown).

The fact is, however, when it comes to actually practicing veganism, there are two contravening factors: my laziness and my character.

RE Laziness:
I am stunningly lazy. And being vegan in Korea (where everything you eat, when eating out, in infused with animal product; and where meat-eating is fetishized to an even greater degree than in the US – really!). Also, my laziness affects my ability to resist cravings and habit, too. I have a craving for, and a habit for, things like dairy products, especially. I just simply like them, and not eating them is hard. Kind of like jogging every day is hard. And so, because of my laziness, I don't do it. I buy cheese, and eat it. I keep butter, because I like it. I have tuna, because it's easier than making sure I've complemented my grains and legumes properly in every meal so as to get the right dosage of protein. Laziness.

RE Character:
I am socially a chameleon. I'm timid, in a way. I don't like to "make waves" when socializing with people, and socializing with people is often done over food. I prefer seek out moderation, and seek out the path of least resistance in social situations. And especially in Korea, declaring one can't eat or drink anything (anything!) leads to a lot of difficult excuses, white lies and justifications, for Koreans take near-personal offense if one doesn't eat or drink something on offer. Some in younger generations or who have lived abroad will keep their mouths shut about this, but the offense and confusion, even in those cases, is still there. Trust me.

It's very difficult for Koreans to understand NOT eating something.  Perhaps it's the fact that only 2 generations ago, starvation was common, even in South Korea. Starving people rarely make judgments about the suitability of different types of food. And I feel uncomfortable coming across like I'm judging other people, which any declaration of dietary rule-following tends to come across as – it's not my place. Character.

So I'm an opportunitarian. I never buy meat for at home, because I don't actually like meat, so not eating meat is easy for me. But I am unable to kick the dairy-products habit, and I keep eggs and fish, sometimes, too. And when I'm out, I'll eat whatever is given to me:  strange Korean things… raw flesh of animals and sea monsters, blood sausages, barely dead creatures, etc. I'm just trying to be polite. It creates a lot of goodwill in my hosts. That goodwill is important.

Caveat: 이것은 흑마늘 매우 맛있구나

I met with my friend Mr Kim, yesterday.  We went hiking on Mudeungsan, which I’ve hiked parts of, twice before, but never to the top – it was over 6 hours, round trip, and we were basically jogging down, the last hour, trying to beat the setting sun, because we’d gotten a late start.
The late start was because we’d taken our time.  He took me to his alma mater, Chosun University.  It has a very attractive campus nestled on a southwest-facing hillside on the eastern edge of downtown Gwangju.  It’s probably the most attractive university campus that I’ve seen in Korea, and it reminded me quite a bit of Humboldt State in its hillside layout.
The main building of the campus is against the hillside, quite a ways up, just like Humboldt’s Founder’s Hall is in Arcata.  But the building is huge, and of a very distinctive architecture.  Seeing it from a distance, looking up at it, I had always assumed it was one of those postmodern follies dating from a recent decade, but today I learned that the building in fact was made in 1946, making it that rarest of Korean architectural gems:  a structure that is post-colonial but pre-Korean War – at the height of Americanizing influence in the peninsula, during the post-WWII occupation, but when things were much more idealistic than in the no-more-utopias phase that came after the 6/25/1950 war (as they call it, here).
After the campus tour, we parked at the very touristy base of the mountain, the west-facing, Gwangju entrance of Mudeungsan Park.  We then went to one of the plethora of restaurants that cluster there, to serve the infinitude of day-hikers.  The place that we went was absolutely the most delicious Korean restaurant I’ve eaten at in recent memory.
One highlight was the 도토리수재비 [do-to-ri-su-jae-bi], which is a kind of nuts and dumplings savory soup or stew.  No meat or fish (which always strikes a chord with me), loaded with all sorts of different kinds of roots, veggies and nuts, a thick, umamiful (yes, I just made that word up, but look up umami in wikipedia sometime) broth, and these amazing acorn-flour dumplings (really, they were Korean acorny gnocchi).
The absolute culinary miracle, for me, however, was something I will never forget – my first taste of 흑마늘 [heuk-ma-neul], roasted, sweet, black garlic.  Oh, this was a truly amazing treat – imagine whole cloves of garlic with a consistency and vague taste of chocolate, that you can eat like candy.
We finally started hiking at about 1220.
Here are some pictures of the campus and the lunch.  I will put pictures from the actual hike at a later post.
Looking down on the Gwangjuscape from the main building at Chosun University.
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The distinctive and ancient (by modern Korean standards – 1946!) and massive main building of the university.
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The stairs leading down from in front of the main hall to the rest of campus, including the dormitory building and the 16 floor engineering building where my friend Mr Kim studied nuclear engineering back in the 80s, in the distance.
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The spread, for lunch.  Look at all those amazing banchan (side dishes).
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And the really stunning, delicious, unique roasted black garlic.
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Caveat: Cute Monsters, Kimbap, Cake, etc.

Thank you, all, for the happy birthday wishes! 

This blog post will be a disorganized miscellany.

1.  We made "monsters" in my first-grade afterschool class on Monday.  This picture shows some of my favorites.

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2.  On Tuesday, our "Yeonggwang Study Group" of foreign teachers, that's been taking shape to try to study some Korean Language together, met at Anelle's and learned how to make kimbap (a sort of Korean take on what Americans call "California Roll" and often incorrectly identify as sushi, which is something completely different).  Kimbap has things like radish, ham, crab, cucumber and carrot rolled together with rice in a sheet of seaweed.  Here is a picture of my first-ever kimbap that I made.  

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3.  I have so far received 16 happy-birthday wishes on facebook, as well as several non-facebook induced emails.  Not only that, but several of my English-teaching colleagues at Hongnong Chodeung Hakgyo threw a sort of surprise party for me, with a little fruit-topped cake bought from the Yeonggwang Paris Baguette shop.  I was deeply flattered and touched.  Birthdays are hard for me – they always have been.  I have a deeply disharmonious relationship with the passage of time, and birthdays are a notably overt marker of this.  But it's pleasing to be "appreciated" by a little party, especially since it was a genuine surprise – I really wasn't expecting it.

Caveat: Masa de Harina Nixtamalera

Seungbae es uno de mis mejores amigos coreanos.  Anoche cuando llegué a Suwon, me dijo de inmediato, "I think you need Mexican food."  Así, claro que me conoce bien.  Nos metimos en su pequeña van amarilla y manejamos a Osan, donde cenamos fajitas y quesadillas y horchata, todas hechas por cocineros verdaderamente mexicanos.  Los chilangos de Osan, Corea, con su improbable proyecto de dar a los gringos (y ¡pochos! porque así son las fuerzas militares estadunidenses, en estos días) de la base aérea ahí un sabor de su continente extrañado.

[broken link! FIXME] Images  Hablé con el cocinero sobre el problema de encontrar la masa de harina verdademente mexicana.  Me explicó lo que ya había sospechado:  por alguna extraña regla proteccionista, no se permite importar la harina nixtamalera en Corea.  Ésta es la harina de maíz que se usa para hacer tortillas mexicanas frescas, tamales, sopes, pupusas, etc.  Me decía que cualquier otra necesidad de la cocina mexicana ha podido encontrar en Seul, menos esta.  Incluso a traído maletas desde Los Angeles o Chicago o DF a este país llenas de maseca (la marca mas conocida de masa de harina). 

Después de comer Seungbae y yo hablamos algunas horas acerca de las dificultades de la vida, en nuestra singular mescla de español, inglés y coreano.  Es un hombre muy inteligente, con buen sentido de humor.  Acerca de mis dificultades digamos emocionales con mi lugar de trabajo, me dijo: "there is no good medications except for time."  Que es exactamente la verdad, e?

Estuvo bien.  Hoy voy a ver a mi otro buen amigo coreano, en Ilsan.

Caveat: An Accidental Curry

12 PM rolled around, and, since it's Saturday and I've decided to be a homebody today, I realized I needed to cook lunch for myself – there's no convenient cafeteria, here, to vist at 12:30 promptly, with it's reliable supply of seaweed soup, rice, kimchi, etc.

I didn't really have much to work with.  I put some rice in my rice cooker, and decided to stir fry some vegetables.  But all I had was one green pepper, 2 mushrooms, and plenty of delicious onions.  I chopped them up and threw them in my fry pan.  I gurgled some cooking oil, and added some basil and chopped garlic, a dash of soy sauce (instead of salt, that's what I tend to use), and then I had an inspiration.

I was looking at some fat, juicy apples.  And I had some rather weird, organic, Korean yoghurt that some students had bequeathed on me after a field trip to a dairy last week.  And I thought – aha! – curry.

I chopped up an apple.  I found my raisins (that I sometimes nibble on for a desert type thing).  But the key was that although I had no curry powder, I had all the essentials for making my own:  tumeric (dump, dump, dump), powdered coriander (dump, dump), black pepper (dash, dash), ground clove (dash), Korean red pepper powder (dump).  That makes a passable curry – I've done it before.

Then, in an added inspiration, I looked at the dry-looking development in the fry pan, and thought to moisten it with a half-cup of orange juice.  Curry is most delicious when it's slightly sweet (with e.g. fruit), but spicy as heck.   And so then, after simmering this combo for a while, I added some of  the yoghurt, making it a deep goldenish brown colored glop, and stirred it all together.  And put it over my rice.

It was the most delicious freaking curry I've had in ages!  Certainly better than the pasty, bland Korean and/or Japanese styles I've gotten used to.  And spicy as heck!  I'm sweating.  Sweat.  Sweat.

I experiment a lot in the kitchen.  But  I tend not to talk about the failures. This was defnitely no failure.  Yay.  ^_^

Caveat: Foodie?

Here is a little-known secret fact about me.

There are not that many websites for which I am a "regular." Most you could probably deduce, simply by "reading between the lines" on my blog a little bit: huffingtonpost, theregister.co.uk, wikipedia, theatlantic.com. But there was one that surprised even myself, when I caught myself typing this address into my browser this morning: latimes.com/features/food/.

Hmm… jeez, am I a "foodie"?

Maybe. I sometimes fantasize about my "next career" being that of chef. Not that it will come true. Why, specifically, LA Times? Because it's a pretty good food section – there are so many interesting restaurants and food trends happening in LA. Also, at least so far, the LA Times is one of the few major US newspapers that hasn't taken to experimenting with throwing up "pay barriers" for their online content. Not to mention the fact that I lived in LA for almost 10 years, and that was one of the paper-pulp version's sections that I browsed pretty loyally – sitting in the Burbank Starbucks on Saturday mornings, and all that.

Caveat: Tacos al pastor

[broken link! FIXME] P1040476 Al fin de cuentas, ayer en la tarde no pude resister un viajecito rapidito hacía Seul para visitar mi librería favorito, el muy bueno 교보문고 (Kyobo Mungo), donde me compré un nuevo atlas coreano y el número más reciente de mi revista preferida, The Economist.   Todavía no sé exactamente como voy a aguantar el hecho de que no voy a poder comprar aquella revista cada semana en mi nuevo pueblo en Yeonggwang… tal vez tendré que inscribirme para recibirla por correos.

Pero lo más importante fue una visita al restaurante Dos Tacos (que se escribe en hangeul 도스타코스 = doseutakoseu), que tienen los mejores tacos al pastor en Corea (izquierda).  También comimos unos taquitos de pollo (que suelen llamarse flautas) muy bien hechos.

Fuimos yo y mi amigo Peter, quien recién se ha acabado con su contrato en hagwon en Ilsan y se ha dedicado a pasar un rato de modo de turista antes de volver a los EEUU.

Después, anoche, Peter vino a Suwon y salimos con mis amigos Mr Choi y Seungbae, y acompañados por un señor alemán bastante divertido que se está hospedando en la casa de huéspedes acá.  Resulta que Peter habla alemán excelentemente.  Tomamos makkoli y comimos un kimchijeon muy sabroso.

Ahora son las seis y media de la mañana de domingo, y estoy arreglando mis libros y otras posesiones los cuales vine a recoger, para poder llevarlos todo a Yeonggwang.  Me alegraré ya no tener mis cosas tan distruibidas por todo el país.

Caveat: きつねうどん

I had kitsune udon for dinner last night and it was incredibly delicious.  It’s a type of udon (thick wheat noodles) served with broth and fried tofu (called 油揚げ=aburaage).  I think I must have had it a long time ago, but I didn’t remember what it was.  Now I think I will have to remember it and try making it sometime, or some creative derivative.
I keep flirting with vegetarianism, as many people know.  And the last few months, especially, I’ve been feeling really negative about meat, except perhaps seafood.  I’m not sure what’s driving it.  Partly, it’s health – I really think eating a lot of meat must be unhealthy.  The last few times I’ve had beef or pork, I’ve had an upset stomach for days afterward.
Also, there are all the articles I’ve read explaining that consuming meat (especially beef) has a carbon footprint as large as, if not larger than, driving cars, for example (under an average American’s diet, anyway).
Finally, I just seem to find a well-cooked and balanced vegetarian meal quite delicious.  So maybe it’s just a matter of personal aesthetics.
I’m unlikely to take the leap to a full-blown vegetarian commitment, as it’s not really my character.  I almost always eat what people suggest or put in front of me when I’m dining with others, both out of cultural deference and because I like trying new things.  But I will continue to explore vegetarian and vegan cuisine when given the option.

Caveat: 치즈라면

Yesterday, I zoomed out to Ilsan after signing my contract, because I wanted to thank two of the people who made the contract possible, which were my two former bosses who gave me such glowing recommendations.

I stopped by the hagwon where my friend Peter teaches, too, and we had a quick supper at a local hole-in-the-wall Korean fast-food joint (these are called 분식집: bun-shik-jip = minute-meal-house).

I ordered 치즈라면 (chi-jeu-ra-myeon = cheese ramen), which holds a special place in my heart.

pictureCheese ramen is the first “Korean cuisine” meal that I ever ate in Korea. I was stationed at Camp Edwards in 1990-91 while in the US Army, and I was out running some errand over to Camp Casey at Dongduchon with my sergeant. We were zooming along in our humvee, on some twisting road (there were no expressways back then, yet, in northern Gyeonggi-do, like there are now), and the sergeant announced we were stopping for lunch.  We pulled up at some apparently random “next-to-some-US-base” ramen joint, that was set up at the intersection of two roads, and he ordered us cheese ramen from the ajumma that apparently knew him.
“Korean delicacy,” he explained, tersely.

“Yes, sergeant,” I nodded.  I was curious and excited to finally have an “off-post” cultural experience, having been on “lock-down” for my first 3 months in Korea (due to the gulf war going on in Kuwait, half a world away).

Being February, it was cold.  The warm, gooey mess of spicy ramen with a slab of plasticine american cheese melted into it was comforting – a perfect mix of the exotic and familiar. I was hooked, and have been ever since. Living in the US, I would simulate Korean cheese ramyeon by adding a teaspoon of cayenne pepper and a slice or two of american cheese to bland, US-purchased Japanese-style ramen, such as Maruchan or Smack Ramen.

Yesterday’s cheese ramen was, as usual, unnaturally delicious and warmly nostalgic.

How is it that we later feel nostalgic for times in our lives that, at the time we were living them, were so difficult and unpleasant?
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Caveat: Mole poblano en Osan

He encontrado un nuevo amigo acá en Suwon.  Es un coreano hispanohablante, que parece ser una clase de persona tan rara como un gringo coreanohablante, por ejemplo.  Parece que se ha afiliado conmigo porque se dio cuenta de que yo podría ofrecerle oportunidades de practicar el español.  No siempre hablamos español, porque siente más cómodo en inglés.  También, me brinda lecciones en coreano con mucha paciencia. 

Anoche me llamó y anunció que querría invitarme a cenar en un restorán mexicano que conoce.   Entonces, fuimos manejando casi 40 minutos, partiendo directamente hacia el sur de Suwon, para llegar en la ciudad de Osan.  Lo interesante de Osan es que es una ciudad donde se ubica una de las bases más grandes estadounidenses en toda Corea.  Me acuerdo haber pasado una noche allí en 1991.  Por esta razón, hay muchas tropas estadounidenses residentes en el pueblo, y hay muchos comercios orientados al negocio con estos extranjeros.  Así, se explica la presencia de un restorán mexicano, bastante auténtico (digamos según un estandar norteamericano si no según un estandar mexicano puro).

Comimos una cena temprana de sopes y mole poblano, y tomamos horchata.  Pareció un milagro, poder hacer esto en Osan, Corea.  La comida era bastante bien, aunque el mole era un poco débil, probablemente para mejor adaptarse al gusto de las tropas gringas más que por acomodarse al gusto de los coreanos.

Tuve la oportunidad de hablar con el cocinero, un verdadero mexicano chilango de Ecatepec, bastante amigable si no tan entusiasmado de su estadía en Corea.  Me explicó que al terminar su contrato, volvería a México, pero que la oportunidad de vivir en un país extranjero "tan extranjero" como Corea había sido muy interesante.

Después de nuestra cena, exploramos la ciudad de Osan un poquito, y finalmente volvimos a Suwon.  A las once, mas o menos, comimos otra cena más ligera, como es la costumbre coreana en noches sociales, de 회 (sashimi, pescado crudo). 

Igual con casi todos los coreanos que he tenido la oportunidad de conocer, este nuevo amigo mio tiene un sinfín de conceptos difusos sobre posibilidades de futuros negocios, en el campo de intercambios interenacionales de jovenes y agencias de empleo para extranjeros en corea.  Incluso, me quiere reclutar como partner de negocios.  Siempre hay que aguantar tal clase de vagos ofrecimientos, porque Corea parece ser un reino de entrepreneurs frustrados.  No me molesta de ninguna manera, aunque a veces tengo que cuidar mi cinismo.

Aquel fue mi noche vagamente mexicanizada.  Hoy, vuelvo al estudio del idioma coreano.  Estudia, estudia, estudia!  파이팅!

Caveat: 밥 먹었어요

I ate dinner.

A very Korean dinner. To start with, I went shopping at the market area east of the 팔달문 (Paldalmun, which is the south gate of the city wall), rather than at a 슈퍼 (shu-pa = supermarket).  I got three kinds of kimchi (regular, “white” and radish), I got some tiny dried fish that I still haven’t figured out what they’re called [update, 4 hours later: my friends Christine and Jinhee both made comments and told me what they’re called. 멸치 = myulchi, little dried anchovies. I’ll put a picture down at the bottom of this entry. Thanks!], I got 오뎅 (odeng = “fish sausage”) and a bag of polished (sticky) rice. Finally, I got some 김 (kim = “dried squares of seaweed”).

I came back to the kitchen at my guesthouse. I stir-fried some chopped onions with the odeng and a dash of salt. I cooked rice in the rice cooker.  I put my varieties of kimchi in tupperware buckets. And I sat down with the guesthouse owner-guy to a meal cooked rice, kimchi in containers, tiny fish, kim, and the bokkeum odeng wa yangpa, eating chopsticksfull of each thing from each container with the rice.

I’ve decided to stay in this guesthouse in Suwon. It’s terribly inconvenient, since my class is in Gangnam, but the rent here simply can’t be beat.  And the owner is really friendly without being overbearing. The regular nightly charge is only 20,000 won (around $18 at current exchange rates), but the owner gave me a 50% discount if I committed to staying a full month. That means less than $10 per night – cheaper than rent in a regular studio apartment anywhere in Seoul (and that would require a 1 year contract). There’s internet here, and a kitchen and all the basic necessities.  So even with the cost of the commute (about $5 per day round trip to Gangnam), it’s a pretty darn inexpensive living situation.

I can use the commute time to veg out or study or whatever. It’s about an hour on a direct Suwon-Gangnam bus (the #3000 is almost door-to-door, guesthouse to hagwon), or a slightly circuitous subway + bus takes about an hour and a half (but runs more frequently, so timing is less of an issue).
Finally, Suwon has grown on me a little bit, in its extraordinarily mercantile, unglamorous way – it’s kind of the polar opposite of the Beverly-Hills-like character of Gangnam. A nice antidote, as it were, at the close of each day’s studying.

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Caveat: 떡복기를 먹을 필요했어요

Last night I needed to eat tteokbokki.  This is not the first time I’ve suffered this craving.  It seems to be strong on cold nights.  It’s Korean glutinous rice cakes, simmered with fish-sausage in a slightly sweet carrot-chili-garlic sauce, sometimes with some dregs of vegetables if it’s higher quality.  Served in bags or bowls on street corners for a buck or two.

Caveat: Chupe de Pescado

I went to Costa Mesa and ate lunch at Inka Grill restaurant today.  I met an old friend Mary there, since she lives in Orange County, that was convenient. 

I have been craving chupe de pescado a lot.  I used to eat it there when I was working in Newport Beach (an office park near the Costa Mesa city line).  I was glad it was still there.

And I spent a lot of time driving around LA freeways.  They're so familiar.  A strange sort of frustration/comfort sets in.

Now I'm at LAX.  I'm going back to Korea.  I will experience no January 6, 2010, because of the date line.  Maybe I should post something very strange and otherworldly for that date, because of this?

Caveat: Korean Food in Eagan

I went out to lunch at a Korean restaurant in a strip mall along highway 13 in Eagan, with a bunch of friends: Bob and Sarah and Henry, and Mark and Amy and Charlie and Martin, and Tayo (Bob’s nephew) was along too.

Our expectations were low. And… I’ve not eaten Korean since coming back from Korea. Surprising? A little, maybe, but I figure I’ll be getting plenty of Korean soon enough, when I go back. Still, we decided to try it out — it’s basically across the highway from where my storage unit is, so it’s conveniently located.

It turned out to be very good. Authentic feeling, and excellent food. I highly recommend Hoban Restaurant to anyone living in or passing through Minnesota and craving a “real” Korean dining experience. I had some kimchi dolsotbap which was excellent.

With Bob and Mark both there, it’s been a bit of an “1808 Portland” reunion — 1808 Portland Avenue in St Paul is the duplex house that Bob, Mark and I shared as housemates (along with some others) back in the 1980’s, at the time I was attending the University of Minnesota. I drove by that place the other day, and took a picture, for old-time’s sake — I have such fond memories of my time living there (over 2 years, I think):

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Caveat: Beets

One reason I love visiting with my friend Bob is that he inspires me and motivates me to cook things that I love to eat. When we were roommates, many years ago, we used to concoct all kinds of things together, and he always seemed to bring out my creativity in the kitchen. Certainly it’s true that cooking with (and for) others is much more fun than cooking by myself, which is why I almost never cooked anything elaborate in Korea.
So, Bob motivated me to make something I often crave: borsht.
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