Back to Seoul, back to Namdaemun Market. My first report from the market was of an excellent lunch in the market’s famous Kalguksu Alley. I ate there on the day of my second visit to the market. I visited the market on three consecutive days and ate lunch there on three consecutive days. Why didn’t I eat at Kalguksu Alley on the first day? Well, I couldn’t find it. On that first visit I was also unable to find the market’s other famous food “alley”: Hairtail Alley; the specialty here is galchi jorim or braised/stewed hairtail fish. The main reason I was unable to find these alleys is that I didn’t know what I was looking for. I’d not really done any research on the market and had lazily assumed that everything would be very visible. Well, the market itself is quite obviously visible but there’s no signage for the food alleys—you kind of have to know where you’re going and what you’re looking for. In my post on that Kalguksu Alley lunch, I told you how to find it; in this post I offer a broader look at the market and finally a look at Hairtail Alley, which I more or less accidentally found myself in while wandering around after lunch in Kalguksu Alley. Continue reading
Tag Archives: Urban Markets
Margao Fish Market (Goa, January 2023)
Almost exactly three years after our trip to Goa in 2020, we went back again for a week. Once again, we were staying at the home of friends in south Goa (they don’t live there but very kindly make their lovely house available to close friends and family). One of the highlights of that trip was buying fish and shellfish at the local fish market and having the cook we’d hired in the village we were staying in cook it up for us. I’d posted a look at that market—the Thursday market in the town of Assolna—not long after getting back to the US in 2020. This time I have a look at a fish market for you before getting back to the US (we’re in Delhi for a few more days), but it’s not the same fish market. We arrived this time on a Sunday and didn’t want to wait till Thursday to get the local fish and seafood dinners going. Accordingly, the first thing we did after landing at Dabolim airport was make a beeline for the big fish market in Margao, before heading to our home base in Velim. Herewith a look at that market. Continue reading
Eating At Mercado Central (Minneapolis)
Something that a lot of people in other parts of the US don’t know about Minnesota is that we have a large Hispanic population here—and following that, a pretty good Hispanic food scene. Mexican food dominates this scene, predictably, but there’s also good food to be had from elsewhere in Latin America. Hell, I’m not sure that a lot of people who live in Minnesota are as aware of this as they should be. Sadly, the local professional food press barely highlights any of this, just as they barely highlight any restaurants serving the food of recent immigrant communities. Their attention seems to be almost entirely taken up by p.r-driven restaurants of the kind that get nominated for James Beard awards. Now, I like eating at some of those restaurants too but they’re only a small part of the larger food scene in the Twin Cities metro. Those who have anxieties about the Twin Cities not being seen as cosmopolitan enough by coastal observers might consider that cosmopolitanism is not experienced only at the high end. Continue reading
A Lot of Fish and Some Vegetables at Chittaranjan Park Market (Delhi, March 2022)
I have been in Delhi for just over a week now (and will be here for just under another week). If you’ve been following my gluttony on Twitter, you’ll know that I’ve been eating rather a lot. Well, I suppose that wouldn’t come as a surprise to anyone who reads this blog, even if you don’t follow me on Twitter. Most of my meals have been eaten at home and many of them feature a genre not easily replicable in the US: Bengali fish dishes. Yes, Bengali fish (mostly from Bangladesh) can be found frozen in desi stores but I stopped buying them a long time ago over concerns about sustainability etc. When in Delhi though I partake freely. Now, you may be wondering how I partake freely of Bengali fish in Delhi but you shouldn’t. There’s been a large Bengali population in the city for a long time (part of the larger Bengali diaspora). Bengalis are spread over the city but it is the neighbourhood of Chittaranjan Park in South Delhi that is the most iconic locus of Bengali life in the city. And it is in the Chittaranjan Park market that the best Bengali fish can be found. Or so my mother insists, anyway, having shopped here for several decades. Today I accompanied her to the market to buy some fish. We also bought some veg. Here is the pictorial evidence. Continue reading
A Quick Lunch at Moroccan Flavors at the Midtown Global Market (Minneapolis)
I was up in Minneapolis for some annual medical appointments earlier this week. Due to some scheduling complications what was supposed to have been a few appointments in the mid-morning became appointments before and after lunch. I wasn’t sure where I could go for an outdoor bite in the area and so rolled the dice and decided to walk to the Midtown Global Market. Early lunch on a weekday, I reasoned, was not likely to find the market crowded and thankfully this proved to be true (well, the vendors at the market would probably prefer it otherwise). There were other people there eating but there was plenty of space and most people seemed to be masked when not eating. I knew where I was headed: to Moroccan Flavors. I last reported on a meal there in early 2017 (they’d opened the previous year). We really enjoyed that meal and I cannot explain to you why we haven’t been back. Well, I went back on Tuesday and had another excellent meal. After the meal I wandered the market a little, noting some changes. Here is a quick look at it all. Continue reading
The City Market and Lunch at Pigwich (Kansas City)
I do very much enjoy walking around urban markets in cities I visit. Accordingly, a stop at Kansas City’s City Market was on our itinerary. Originally, this was supposed to be our last stop on the Thursday of our trip. It’s located in the north of the city, right by Highway 35 and the plan had been to go for a walk by the river, browse the market, eat a quick lunch at Pigwich and hit the road. All of this got thrown for a loop by my lame trip planning. I’d put a visit to the Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art on the agenda for Wednesday (preceded by lunch at Gates-Bar-B-Q). Of course, since I only bothered to look at the museum’s website closely on Wednesday morning I discovered rather late in the game that the Nelson-Atkins is closed on Tuesday and Wednesdays. (Isn’t all this detail fascinating?!) So we went to the Nelson-Atkins and Gates on our last day and on Wednesday started out with a walk by the river, a stroll through the City Market and lunch at Pigwich. Here’s how it went. Continue reading
Scenes from the Thursday Market in Assolna (Goa, January 2020)
I still have a few restaurant reports to post from our two weeks in Delhi in the first half of January but I cannot resist first posting this gallery of images from what was one of my favourite outings during the following week we spent in Goa: shopping for fish/seafood at the local village market in Assolna in South Goa. We spent a week in the lovely home of old friends in the even smaller* village of Velim. We spent most of almost every single day there on the beach and ate lunches out. We hired a cook from the village to prepare our breakfasts and dinners (we were the only ones in the house). Quite apart from not wanting to spend too much of the day on cooking, this allowed us to eat Goan food twice a day, and in particular it allowed us to eat a lot of local fish and shellfish. Continue reading
Wandering and Eating at Chelsea Market (New York, August 2019)
This was actually our second full day in New York, and our first Sunday. The major plans for the day involved a walk on the High Line followed by a production of Puffs (a Harry Potter parody/tribute we took the boys too and which they loved). After that we were scheduled for early dinner with an old friend at Bombay Bread Bar. Those dinner plans changed later—we ended up at Ippudo Ramen instead and ate at Bombay Bread Bar the following weekend—but we needed to grab an early lunch before getting on the High Line. Looking around on Google Maps, Chelsea Market looked like a good place to get a range of things we might all like. Continue reading
Mangal Bazar (Delhi, December 2018)
In Minnesota, in Montreal, in London, in Hong Kong I’ve taken pictures of green markets and posted them in slideshows on the blog. But though I’d been back home to Delhi three times between starting the blog and my most recent trip in December, I had not done the same from there. In some places you’re a traveler and in some places you’re just at home. Going to the market when I’m back home is no more remarkable an affair than going to Cub Foods here. But on this trip, perhaps because I’d made two market reports from Hong Kong, I took my camera with me on a visit to the weekly haat (or open-air market) by my parents’ neighbourhood of Sector 25, NOIDA (a suburb of Delhi). Here are most of the photos I took. Continue reading
Duke of York’s Square Market (London, June 2018)
Okay, here it is finally: the last report from our London trip in June. Yes, almost exactly nine months ago. We spent 10 days in London after a week in Scotland; it was mostly a nostalgia trip. We spent three months there as a family in the spring of 2017 and loved it to the point of fantasizing about ways to move there, either now or in retirement (there are no such ways). We particularly loved being there with our kids—with wonderful parks and free museums and a wide range of food, London is really a wonderful place to visit with children. And so we’d hoped we’d be able to go back with them. We didn’t expect, however, that it would happen as soon as it did. But a conference in Edinburgh that we could both attend presented itself and we decided to splurge and take the boys with us and add on extra days in the north of Scotland and in London. They’re still so young that they’re unlikely to remember their longer time in London clearly without added reinforcement; and with work paying for airfare it was doable without too much of a wrench. Continue reading
Seafood and More at Sai Ying Pun Market (Hong Kong, 2018)
As I’ve mentioned before, I really enjoy walking around food markets in cities I’m visiting. Whether in Montreal, London or even St. Paul, if there’s a big produce market and I have time to visit it, I am there. Of course, Hong Kong is the ideal city for one with such preferences. I’ve already posted a couple of reports from the Graham Street wet market, located fortuitously right next to my hotel. Today I have a report from a covered market (well, two actually) about a 20 minute walk away: mostly from the Sai Ying Pun Market and a bit from the Centre Street Market. My interest in the former stemmed from having read about its seafood section and that is what this report is heavy on. The vegetarians should console themselves with the pictures of vegetables that start the slideshow and those of tofu etc. from Centre Street Market. Or just go back and look at the post on roadside fruit and veg. Continue reading
Roadside Fruit and Veg in Hong Kong (December 2018)
On Sunday I posted a slideshow of images taken on walks around my hotel on my first day in Hong Kong. This may have led you to believe that there would be a separate report for every day after that as well. But when not in meetings, I’ve spent most of my time walking around the city and taking photographs rather than posting them to the blog. But as they pile up in my folders I remember that I’m not yet done posting reports on my trip to Scotland in the summer; and so faced with the prospect of reporting on this trip for the next two years, I’m going to try to speed it up a bit. Accordingly, here is a slideshow of pictures of fruit and veg taken at roadside markets and stalls. Hopefully this will mollify the vegetarians among my readers who may have found the meat pictures in the previous Hong Kong post to be a bit much. Continue reading
Midtown Global Market (Minneapolis)
The Midtown Global Market was the first place I ever ate at in Minnesota. This was a little less than a year before we moved to Minnesota, and just a few months after it opened in May, 2006. I was visiting St. Paul on work and my friend Mike and I drove over to check it out. I got some wonderful octopus tacos from La Sirena Gorda and Mike got tacos from Los Ocampo’s counter, if I remember correctly. It was a vibrant, fun space and it made an impression on me that was quite different from the image of Minnesota I’d put together from my years in the western US. (This impression was bolstered later that weekend at a meal at Saigon in St. Paul.) A few months later we had to decide whether to remain in Colorado or make a jump to Minnesota, and this impression of a culturally diverse Minnesota helped make up our minds—it also probably didn’t hurt that it was very warm in the Twin Cities during my visit in early November, 2006.
Well, November isn’t always warm here, and La Sirena Gorda, alas, is long gone—as are some of our other early favourites there—but the Midtown Market is still going strong, with new food outlets and merchants who are excellent in their own right; indeed, it seems very entrenched now in the local scene. Here is a quick look at it for the benefit of those who have somehow never been, or have not been in a while. Continue reading
Hong Kong, Day 1 (December 2018)
After an exhausting day of travel that included flight delays and damaged baggage before I even got on my 15 hour flight from LAX, I finally arrived at Hong Kong on Saturday morning, feeling a bit like damaged goods myself. And extra surly as—unlike in 2016—I’m here by myself this time; and unlike some people, I do not like traveling alone.
I was greeted by a massive, snaking line at immigration but it moved surprisingly quickly. Emerging with my suitcase (thankfully not beat up further), I made a beeline for Crystal Jade and applied some excellent dumplings to my exhaustion. Then aboard the Airport Express train to Hong Kong Station and a quick cab ride to my friend’s home up in the Mid-Levels, to wait out the time till my check-in at the hotel. Drank some masala chai, called my hotel—who were kind enough to give me an early check-in—and cabbed down to Central, to Wellington St. It was lunch time and so setting my bags down, I ventured forth. Continue reading
Borough Market: Eating (London)
At the end of April I posted a large gallery of photographs taken at London’s Borough Market. In the shadow of Southwark Cathedral and right by London Bridge, Borough Market is a tourist attraction in its own right and the photographs from that first gallery may have given you some sense of how crowded it is on most days. You may have also got the sense that the Borough Market—unlike Montreal’s Jean-Talon market—is not really a farmers’ market: there are in fact very few produce vendors there. What the market is really good for is retail product from small-scale and artisanal producers as well as local fish and meat. It’s also very good for casual eating; of this it may have more than Jean-Talon (though we were, of course, at Jean-Talon at the end of October). The first gallery was focused almost entirely on retail establishments. This gallery—which is even larger—focuses almost entirely on the vendors selling prepared food. Continue reading
Borough Market: Shopping (London)
We’ve been in London just over six weeks now. We’ve barely done any hardcore touristy stuff yet. This is not because we are too cool to do hardcore touristy stuff; it’s because we figured we were going to be here three months and so didn’t need to rush to do any touristy stuff. Well, now there’s only another five weeks and change to go and despite living literally steps away from Westminster Abbey, and passing it every day on the way to the tube station, we haven’t yet gone in. Soon we will go in. But first on Friday we took the kids to Tower Bridge and walked back some of the way along the Thames. And when it came time to figure out lunch, we were right by the Borough Market in Southwark (right by London Bridge)—which is yet another iconic London site that we’d been meaning to but hadn’t yet managed to visit. Well, now we have and I have come back with a very large and somewhat haphazard gallery of images that will hopefully convince you to visit Borough Market whether you’re here for twelve weeks or twelve days. (Well, actually I’ve come back with two large and somewhat haphazard galleries of images, but the second will follow in a week or so.) Continue reading
Jean-Talon Market, Pt. 1 (Montreal)
We were recently in Montreal for a few days. It was a wonderful trip despite the grey weather (and a nightmarish travel day to end it after we missed our early morning nonstop flight back to Minneapolis). We hung out with some old friends who work there, walked around the city and saw a couple of really good exhibitions at the Museum of Fine Arts (one on Toulouse-Lautrec and another on Robert Mapplethorpe). And we ate some very good food. When it comes to food in the French vein, traditional and contemporary, there is probably no better city in North America than Montreal. There certainly isn’t a better city for bakeries and patisseries. I’m going to start my report though not with a bakery or a restaurant but with a visit we made on the morning of our second day there to the famous Jean-Talon market. In case you don’t know, Montreal has a number of public markets that combine traditional farmers’ markets with restaurants/food stands and various purveyors of cheese, pastry, meat, fish etc. And Jean-Talon is the most renowned of these markets. Continue reading
My Annoying Opinions 