I’ve fallen a little behind on my goal of getting all my Seoul reports done by the middle of May. Okay, quite a bit behind. I’m going to try to catch up in a hurry though. Here first is a very image-heavy look at one of our favourite market outings in the city in early March, to Mangwon Market. Like Cheongnyangni Market, Mangwon Market is a traditional farmers’ market, which is to say it is a market where locals go to shop—though it’s quite a bit smaller than Cheongnyangni Market. Located in Mapo-gu, it’s more off the tourist map than Gwangjang Market, Namdaemun Market and Tongin Market—or Noryangjin Fish Market, for that matter. It’s a covered market and once you’re in it, the alleys are lined with cooked food vendors of various kinds. We visited on a Saturday morning and had a very nice time walking slowly through the crowded market, stopping to eat snacks along the way. We also bought some prepared foods to take away with us for dinner and some fresh seafood to cook in the upcoming week. And then as we were leaving the market we couldn’t resist stopping at a small restaurant for some noodle soup and mandu. Here is a look at it all. Continue reading
Category Archives: Seoul
Tim Ho Wan (Seoul, March 2024)
In my report on our meal at Grand Szechuan at the end of March I noted that in our three months away we had barely eaten any Chinese food. I listed two meals: one a Korean-Chinese lunch in Seoul and the other an Indian-Chinese takeout dinner in Delhi. Somehow I forgot about the third, which was the best of the three and the only non-hyphenated Chinese one of the three: dim sum at one of the Seoul outposts of the Tim Ho Wan empire. Tim Ho Wan, as you probably know, started out in 2009 as a no-frills, reasonably priced dim sum shop in Hong Kong, famously picking up a Michelin star. Multiple branches opened in Hong Kong (I’ve previously reported on a quick meal at the Central branch) and then all over the world (including the US). We’ve not eaten at Tim Ho Wan’s US locations but when we saw there were three in Seoul, we couldn’t resist. We ended up eating at the Samseong location in Gangnam. This is the flagship Seoul location and, most importantly, the largest of the three. A long wait seemed the least likely here and that hope proved true. After a brief wait we were seated and very quickly after that we we were eating. Here’s how it went. Continue reading
Woo Lae Oak (Seoul, February 2024)
Somehow we only ate one barbecue meal in Seoul. But it was a good one. Woo Lae Oak has been around since 1946 and is one of the most celebrated restaurants in the city. It’s not the cheapest barbecue place—they use only Korean beef—but it’s also far from the most expensive. What they’re perhaps most famous for isn’t even grilled beef. The origins of the family that owns the restaurant are in North Korea and they are especially known for their Pyongyang-style naengmyeon and some people go there exclusively to eat their naengmyeon. We were there principally for the meat. Of course, it’s a mistake to end any Korean barbecue meal without chilled naengmyeon and so we ate across both sides of their menu, so to speak. Here’s a quick look at the meal. Continue reading
Eating at Noryangjin Fish Market (Seoul, February/March 2024)
Last weekend I posted a look at my visits to Seoul’s famous Noryangjin Fish Market, complete with an excessive slideshow of images. Noryangjin is a massive fish market, yes, but it is not just a fish market. The market also contains a large number of seafood restaurants on the second floor where you can have things you bought at the market cooked up to your specifications or where you can order off a menu as at a regular restaurant. I ate at the market on both visits, accompanied on each occasion by groups of my students. Here now is a report on those two meals, one a weekend lunch in February and the other a weekend dinner in March. As you’ll see, the experiences were not identical. And you’ll be glad to know that together they add up to another excessive slideshow of images. You’re welcome. Continue reading
Mingles (Seoul, February 2024)
The vast majority of our meals out in Seoul—and all the meals I’ve so far reported on—were eaten at more or less casual restaurants and at markets. We did, however, also eat three fancier meals; at places with Michelin stars, no less. Our interest was to see what contemporary high-end Korean cooking looks like, especially in the home country, where diners are intimately familiar with the cuisine in its traditional guises. The first of these three meals was eaten at Mingles, located in Gangnam-gu and currently the holder of two Michelin stars. We ate lunch there on a weekday in late February. Here’s how it went. Continue reading
At Noryangjin Fish Market (Seoul, February 2024)
I’ll stay in Seoul to close out the week but instead of a restaurant report I have for you a look at the city’s premier fish market: the massive Noryangjin Fisheries Wholesale Market. I made two visits to the market. The first was on a weekend early on our trip, with the family and a large group of students; and then towards the end I took a smaller group of students there as well for a birthday-related outing on a weeknight. As it happens, both visits involved eating as well—a major feature of the market is the large number of seafood restaurants where you can have things you buy fresh at the market cooked up for you. However to keep things manageable, I am focussing in this first report only on the market as market. I’ll post my report on the two meals—one a lunch, the other a dinner—next weekend. Continue reading
Myungdong Boribap & Kodari (Seoul, February 2024)
Back to Seoul. This report is actually of our second meal out in the city. We’d arrived the previous day and enjoyed a welcome dinner at Chon in Insadong. We were back in Insadong again the next day. Well, my family and I lived in Insadong for the full five weeks—it’s the students who were back in Insadong the next day. On our agenda was a day of tourism before the program proper began. The first half of the day was spent at the Gyeongbokgung Palace (clad in hanboks for maximum cheese quotient) and environs and the second half was spent walking to and then at Namdaemun Market. In between we had to eat a quick lunch. The itinerary had “lunch on your own” marked on it but we bailed the students out and took them for lunch with us. It had to be quick, it had to be at a place that could take 25 of us and it had to be a place that would be reasonably quick. At the intersection of all these variables was Myungdong Boribap & Kodari on Insadong St. Here’s how it went. Continue reading
Eating at Tongin Market (Seoul, February 2024)
Of all the markets we visited in Seoul in February and March, Tongin Market was the closest to where we were living. It also turned out to be the one least like the others. Gwangjang Market, Namdaemun Market, Cheongnyangni Market, Mangwon Market and the Noryangjin Fish Market are all markets first. Cheongnyangni and Mangwon markets are neighbourhood markets that include some food vendors. Namdaemun Market has famous food alleys but they’re really secondary to the real business of the market which is retail sales. Even Gwangjang Market with its prominent food alley is dominated by shopping during the day. And Norynangjin is a massive wholesale and retail seafood market with restaurants attached. Tongin Market, however, is different: it’s almost entirely about food vendors. It ended up therefore being a very different experience than all the other markets, feeling more like walking through an extended food court. We visited towards the end of February with a large group of students. This is what we found. Continue reading
Namgyung (Seoul, February 2024)
Here, courtesy jet lag, is another quick report on a casual restaurant meal in Seoul. This was eaten in February and features Korean Chinese food. As you may know, like Indian Chinese food, Korean Chinese is its own hybrid cuisine. We don’t see very much of it in the Twin Cities but it’s very popular wherever Koreans live in large numbers—which is to say that it is very popular in Seoul as well. And dishes like jjangmyeon are iconic in the larger Korean culinary repertoire. Even though the missus loves Korean Chinese, we didn’t somehow particularly seek it out in Seoul—I guess there were lots of things we wanted to try there and some more often than others. Accordingly, this report of lunch at Namgyung is not of a meal at a lauded Korean Chinese restaurant, merely one that was convenient right after a lecture the missus had organize (on North Korean cinema) at the hostel at which my students were living in Yeongdeungpo. We took a bunch of the students with us to a late lunch after the talk. Here’s what we ate. Continue reading
Teumsae Ramyun (Seoul, March 2024)
I’d said I’d probably have a review today of one of our fine dining meals in Seoul. Yet again, I have lied to you. I have instead for you a review of a meal at almost the opposite end of the price spectrum, featuring ramyun (the Korean incarnation of ramen). This meal was eaten at the Anguk branch of Teumsae Ramyun, a chain which has been around several decades now. It is one of many similar restaurants all over the city (and the country) which serve cheap meals of packet ramyun that are further customized by the kitchen. Teumsae Ramyun has their own brand of ramyun which is used in their restaurants. They are known for their spicy ramen, which comes in three settings from low to high. They have a few versions of ramyun on the menu, along with a few options for gimbap, rice bowls and mandu/dumplings and that’s it. These are not restaurants to linger in. On weeknights they’re mostly filled with solo diners or pairs eating a quick, cheap meal on their way home from work. Well, we weren’t on our way home from work but we did also stop by on a weeknight. Here’s a quick report on how it went. Continue reading
At Obok in Jongno-gu’s Bossam Alley (Seoul, March 2024)
The Seoul food content train rolls on, barreling from one food alley to another. On Thursday I posted a look at our lunch in Namdaemun Market‘s famous Hairtail Alley; today I have for you a look at another very well-established alley, albeit one not located in a market that is famous in its own right and not one that’s prominent on the tourist trail: Bossam Alley in Jongno-gu. Located not too far from a major street (Jong-ro) lined with massive office buildings, the alley nonetheless feels like it’s far away from the rush of Seoul. It takes up about 150 feet of Supyo-ro 20-gil and if you don’t know it’s there you could pass by none the wiser. You have to go a hundred feet or so into Supyo-ro 20-gil before it even begins. You’ll know you’re there when the alley suddenly narrows dramatically and there’s pig parts everywhere being cooked outside the restaurants that open from one side of the alley. We walked through the alley slowly and then picked a restaurant more or less at random: Obok. And I am happy to say that we had a very good meal there. Continue reading
Eating in Namdaemun Market’s Hairtail Alley (Seoul, February ’24)
One of the mental scars from my trip to Seoul in March 2023 was not being able to eat at Namdaemun Market‘s Hairtail Alley—an enclosed section of the market that features many, many small restaurants that specialize in galchi jorim or hairtail/beltfish/cutlassfish stew and other related dishes. I hasten to add that it’s not that some external force prevented me from eating there; only the rare exercising of personal good judgment. At that point in that trip I had eaten several excessive meals by myself and was not up to the task of eating an order of galchi jorim by myself. And so I left it to the Feb/March trip when I would have lots of company. Well, I am happy to say that I did go back to Hairtail Alley with lots of company on this trip, and that I ate galchi jorim (and other related dishes) and it was good. Herewith the details. Continue reading
Kyochon (Seoul, March 2024)
We ate a decent amount of fried chicken in Seoul. This is, of course, the decent thing to do: fried chicken is an iconic Korean food. I’ve already reported on a more old-school-style fried chicken meal eaten at the Cheongnyangni traditional market. We also ate fried chicken in other market settings and also from the occasional street food stall on the go. This report, however, is on a meal at an outpost of a fried chicken chain, perhaps the most prominent one of them all: Kyochon. Established in 1991, Kyochon now has many, many franchise locations in South Korea and beyond, including a few in the US—though I believe the ones in the US are directly operated by the company. We ate at the location closest to us, not too far from the Bukchon Hanok Village. Here’s how it went. Continue reading
Budae Jigae at Jeongni (DMZ, February 2024)
I know I promised the last of my formal Bombay restaurant reports today but it is has long been established that I am a liar. Also, do you really care? I’ll have that report on Thursday. Possibly. In the meantime, here is a report on a one-dish meal eaten on one of our program outings from Seoul in February. During our second week here we woke up bright and early one morning and headed off in a coach to the DMZ. Early rising and some snow-related delays aside, it was a fascinating day—though I never need to go into that cramped North Korean tunnel again. But this is not a travel blog and so I am not going to tell you about what you can see if you go on one of these DMZ trips from Seoul. All I am going to tell you about is the lunch we ate. Fittingly, it was centered on budae jjigae or “army/military” jigae. Continue reading
Bukchon Kalguksu (Seoul, February 2024)
After yesterday’s image-heavy (and then some) report from Bombay’s Sassoon Dock fish market, I have for you today a relatively restrained report from Seoul. This was one of our earliest meals in the city, eaten on the go just a couple of days after arrival. As with our first two meals (only one of which I’ve yet reported on), this was eaten in a restaurant on Insadong-gil, the main tourist drag of Insadong (the neighbourhood we’ve been living in). The main street is lined with souvenir shops and the like and is a magnet for tourist shopping. The alleys that branch off to the sides are filled with cafes and restaurants. I don’t know if anyone has tried to eat at them all, or if anyone has tried to provide a comprehensive guide to the restaurants on the street. But our experiences suggest that you can’t go very wrong just choosing a place at random. Though not all restaurants in Seoul are great, or even very good, I’m yet to eat at one that comes anywhere close to being mediocre, leave alone bad. Bukchon Kalguksu falls, I would say, in the “quite good” end of the spectrum. Continue reading
Imun Seolnongtang (Seoul, February 2024)
Imun Seolnongtang, located about a 5-7 minute walk from where we’re putting up, is avowedly one of the oldest, if not the oldest formal restaurant in Seoul. Some sites list the year of opening as 1904, others as 1907—either way, it’s more than a century old. And I believe it has been at the same location since the beginning, though the old premises have been replaced by a concrete building. Said building looks deceptively small as you approach but then when you go in you realize that the large white, windowless block that you’d taken to be a neighbouring storehouse is actually where the dining room of the restaurant is located. I apologize for rhetorically making you the one taken in by this when it was in fact me. It’s a very functional dining room, with lots of tables pretty close to each other. There are also a few group dining rooms along one side, one of which has traditional floor seating. No matter where people are seated, however, they’re likely to have a bowl of steaming soup in front of them. We certainly did at the quick lunch we ate there last week. Continue reading
Gwanghwamun Gukbap (Seoul, February 2024)
I’d said I’d have another Bombay report today but I lied. My remaining Bombay reports are very image-heavy and I don’t have the time right now to resize and process large numbers of images. And so I have for you another quick report from Seoul, of lunch at Gwanghwamun Gukbap. I noted in my report of lunch at Ryujung Dakgaejang that Seoul is filled with restaurants that specialize in specific dishes and have very little else on their menus. Well, Gwanghwamun Gukbap does have almost 10 items on their menu but odds are almost every table will have their eponymous gukbap on it. Gukbap literally means soup with rice. Here the soup is made with pork bones and meat and is served with slices of perfectly cooked pork. The rice is not served in the soup, as is traditional, but alongside for you to add as you see fit. I can report that the gukbap is indeed very good but we actually liked another dish even more. Read on for details. Continue reading
Eating and Shopping at Cheongnyangni Market (Seoul, February 2024)
There are very few things I like doing more while traveling than visiting food markets. I have a particular soft spot for fish markets but any large market will do. There’s no better way, I think, than this to get the feel of a place’s energy or to begin to understand its dynamics. What do people eat? Where do they buy it? How much does it cost? What is the culture of buying and selling? What do they not eat? These are important questions if you want to begin to understand a place, and you cannot answer them simply by eating in restaurants. And, of course, if you’re staying in a place for more than a few days and have access to a kitchen, then there’s no better way of feeding yourself. The bonus in Seoul is that pretty much every large market has a plethora of food options and usually at least one kind of food that they’re particularly known for. Such is the case with Cheongnyangni Market. It’s both a sprawling market where you can buy fruits, vegetables, grains, seafood and meat of a dizzying variety and it is home to a well-regarded food “alley”: Tongdak Alley. We visited the market with a group of students a couple of weeks ago, ate lunch there and did a bit of shopping as well. Continue reading
My Annoying Opinions 