Dinner at Gina's

When you're a foodie and wino, your friends tend to be foodies and winos as well and when you have classically trained ex-chefs in your regular group? Well then, it's paradise for us who aren't.

Gina invited us over for dinner on a Friday night.

Beautiful table setting.

Her homemade olive tapenade with sliced baguette.

Yummy! (Gina sells her tapenade by the jar and it's worth every bit.)

Homemade (again) candied walnuts and cheese.

Spinach salad with those walnuts and cheese.

Tomato and mozzarella salad.

Pasta! Gina was griping that it wasn't al dente, but we really didn't care.

Medium rare steak with greens on the side.

We couldn't stop stuffing ourselves. This time it's hummus with bread.

Probably because we had several bottles of wine that night, including this Bordeaux Blanc which hit the spot.

Dessert! A selection of pies and cakes that SH brought over.

And because a homemade meal can't end without a Korean dish, Gina whipped up some bindaetteok...

...and some kimchi jjigae.

Gah, everything was delicious and we were stuffed to our gills. Many thanks to Gina, we heart you! <3

P.S. Gina sells her homemade tapenade and candied walnuts in several different sizes. If you're interested please let me know and I'll pass on the information to her. (Not posting her email because evil spambots lurk on the interwebs.)

Sending off 2010

I recently got a new haircut. Instead of going to my regular stylist, I lugged my lazy derriere to the neighborhood salon (which is 7 minutes away) and surrendered my hair to the no-nonsense-efficient-as-heck ajumma whose scissors snipped snipped snipped in a blur of metallic color. I wound up with a very proper middle school student bowl cut. The haircut isn't bad at all, it's just that seeing my old(er) face underneath that style of youth is somewhat disconcerting. It'll grow out. It's only hair.

Another year is gone. I worked hard and played hard but could've done more serious thinking, read more books, been more compassionate, exercise a bit more. Things left to do for the following year.

I've been very fortunate in many aspects of my life. I'm especiallly fortunate in the people who surround me. Family and friends who tolerate my neurotic extrovert type A personality - they are the ones who help me live my life to the fullest, however sappy that may sound.

Several of my wino friends met up for a 2010 goodbye gathering. We congregated at Doma's. Gina cooked the meal, MJ arranged and set up the whole thing, SH brought wine and gifts, I provided dessert.

And the champagne is chilling.

Gina's made-from-scratch olive pomponette was excellent.

Store bought tuna cubes (from Dongwon) were interesting, perfect canape size.

Oysters on the shell. In Korean, to differentiate them from shucked oysters, they're called 'seokhwa' (석화), literally meaning 'stone flowers'.

"Hamburg steak" under sunnyside eggs and garlic chips.

A "mess" of potatoes and cabbage - Gina's homey dish.

We had several bottles of wine that night.

Dry apple pie, peppermint and chocolate pie, vanilla ice cream,
mini peppermint and lemon meringues.


It's the year of the rabbit next year.
I had brought along a tiny bunny to photograph.
(Originally a cell phone accessory. Cut off the strap, made a cap to hide the fastener.)
Doma gave us plush bunnies that double as speakers when connected to a MP3 player.


Cheers!


May the new year bring you all the happiness and joy and growth to make life meaningful.
See you next year.

Curry, anyone? - Asia Asia in Ilsan

Spicy veggie curry with nan

Rule of thumb about curry in Korea: if it's pronounced 'kah-reh', it's the Japanese style curry we're talking about; if it's pronounced 'kuh-rhee', it's the Indian style. I went for some 'kuh-rhee' at Asia Asia, an "authentic" Indian curry place at the Western Dom in Ilsan.

Gum-achingly sweet plain lassi. There are fruit varieties as well, but I prefer the plain.

Tandoori chicken with spicy sauce and side salad. The chicken, despite being well seasoned, was a bit overcooked and dry. Boo.

The curry. Ample portion for two. I wanted to pour it over pasta, rice, noodles, everything. Made up for the weak chicken.

I really liked the interior. Although not truly Indian, the layout was a well thought out mix of everything South Asian, or with the ambiance of South Asia. Lighting was soft, the music not too loud, no annoying scents that clash with the food (some restaurants have scented candles or burn incense, which I think is nuts), and thankfully the noise from the clients didn't resonate above a certain volume within the space.

Oddly, there was a huge widescreen on one of the walls - when I went Toy Story 3 was playing silently and kept the kids on the other side rather quiet. Not sure what the exact purpose of it is, but if it'll keep kids still in their seats, I'm all for it.

Asia Asia is on the second floor of the Belle Zone of Western Dom, store number I-206 .
We went without reservations and found places in the hall, but for a large party (6 or more) reserve the rooms.

http://www.asiaasia.co.kr

Western Dom is a short walk from Madu Station or Jeongbalsan Station (both line 3) - head towards the MBC Dream Center, or take a bus (check out the list at the bottom of the page for the MBC Dream Center) and get off at Ilsan-donggucheong (일산동구청).

http://www.westerndom.com

On a cold winter's night - Cheongjinok

It's cold, you need something hot, and if it's nourishing to boot? You go for soup.


Cheongjinok is a 70+ year old eatery, famous for its haejangguk. The old place was demolished due to city renovation in 2008 and the new place is in a modern building. Although the old charm is somewhat lost, the taste is the same.

It's not one of those fancy-schmancy restaurants, it's one of those I-came-here-to-eat-a-hearty-and-tasty-meal shikdangs. I love those places, feels like you are at your aunt's place; plop down in a seat, eat and enjoy.

What's on the menu: the aforementioned haejangguk (hangover soup), anjuguk (soup to be eaten with alcoholic beverages), suyuk (boiled beef slices), bindaetteok (mung bean pancake), various jeon, donggeurang-ttaeng (small beef and veggie patty, pan-fried) and the regular Korean alcohol selection of soju, beer, rice wine, baekseju, and bokbunjaju (black raspberry wine). They also provide take-out packages.

Water, cups, napkins and eating utensils are set and ready on the table. Seasonings of pepper, sea salt, red pepper paste and a soy based tasting sauce are also there.

The sole reason I go to Cheongjinok is for their haejang-guk. It arrives steaming hot.

The hot soup contains a variety of innards, congealed ox blood, bean sprouts, and Napa cabbage leaves in a deep flavored, doenjang based beef broth. Although the official name is haejangguk, i.e. hangover soup, I rarely eat it when I actually have a hangover. I just like the taste. Plus, the ingredients of the soup are full of iron, which is good for anemics like me.

The soup is served with rice and kimchi and is available in two sizes - regular and special (=big). I might be skinny as heck but I can down a special with no problem.

Cheongjinok (청진옥)

Situated at Le Meilleur Jongrotown (르메이에르 종로타운) building, on the far left side (facing it)

Subway : Line 1, Jonggak station exit #1, walk straight towards Gwanghwamun direction or Line 5, Gwanghwamun station exit #4, walk towards Jongro direction
Tel: 02-735-1690 (No reservations needed)

Naengmyeon, Chinese style

Autumn is here but the summer heat is stubbornly hanging on, so I'm still consuming naengmyeon to my heart's content. Any sort of cold noodles are good. This time around it's the Chinese version, or to be more exact, the Koreanized Chinese version.

Unlike Korean naengmyeon, the noodles are made of wheat flour like the noodles of jjajangmyeon and jjampong, so if you like naengmyeon mostly because of the texture this dish might not satisfy. But if you're a noodle junkie like me, it's another delicious dish to add to the repertoire. Close up:

The broth is mostly a chicken based stock with lots of seafood thrown in; it varies according to recipes, but almost all have peanut sauce added for a sweet nutty kick. Added toppings also differ by restaurant. The one I went to had a selection of julienned veggies, sea cucumber, jellyfish, shrimp, and soft squid.

As usual, I had a plate of mandu before downing the cold dish. I prefer the small mulmandu (water dumplings, i.e. boiled dumplings) over the pan fried potstickers gunmandu for which Chinese restaurants are well-known.

Had the dish at an ordinary neighborhood Chinese restaurant. (The more fancy places would have higher quality ingredients in the dish.) The food is what you expect from a standard Chinese place in Seoul, not to die for but not bad either. The prices are reasonable and you get your money's worth.

The restaurant is actually a chain and have several stores within the city. (Check out their site seen on the shop sign). The one I went to is in Sinsa-dong but there's no need to haul yourself all the way over here - you can get Chinese naengmyeon at your neighborhood Chinese place.

I don't recommend the delivery-only Chinese places, though. Find a restaurant that has an actual sitting area to be on the safe side, because Chinese naengmyeon can really be a hit or a miss.

Naengmyeon - Hamheung style

Hamheung, the second largest city in North Korea, is the other city famous for the cold noodle dish naengmyeon. (The other being Pyongyang, whose naengmyeon style I've posted about before.) Although naengmyeon comes in both bibim (mixed) and mul ("water") styles in both cities, the Hamheung is known for the former and Pyongyang for the latter.

Pyongyang naengmyeon noodles are made from buckwheat. Hamheung naengmyeon noodles are made of potato or sweet potato starch, which make them especially chewy and rubbery. Servers at restaurants will usually snip the noodles with kitchen shears at the table, unless you have a perverse delight in trying to consume a neverending tangle of noodles in one go. I've discovered that most people's preference for one style over the other usually depends on the texture of the noodles.

I usually order the mul naengmyeon over the bibim in whatever city style. I'm a soup person. But since bibim naengmyeon is Hamheung's original, I went for the bibim this time.

The naengmyeon is composed of noodles, half of a boiled egg, sliced cucumbers and Korean pears, and slices of spicy hongeohweh (홍어회, pickled raw skate fish), all mixed together in a spicy gochujang sauce. Hamheung style bibim naengmyeon is sometimes called hweh (raw fish) naengmyeon for this reason.

Sliced pickled mu as a side dish, and if the spiciness isn't enough for you, you can add hot mustard to up the tongue-burn factor. (Korean mustard isn't like the western mustard; think of it as a yellow wasabi.)

Bibim naengmyeon is generally served with a cup of hot soup broth. Some restaurants might serve myeonsu (면수, noodle water), the water in which the noodles were boiled in, which is rich in the slightly nutty roasted flavor of the noodles. The restaurant I went to served broth. (See top photo.)

The restaurant I went to was one of those generic naengmyeon places that you'd see in any commercial district; nothing remarkable. But as with Pyongyang naengmyeon, it's better to go to a restaurant that serves naengmyeon as its main dish, instead of one that just happens to have naengmyeon on their menu.

Cozy dining at Gallery Hyun

I like eating out a lot. Mostly because I get so darn tired of my own cooking; there's a limit to the experimentation of new recipes one is willing to go through when you're cooking for yourself. And I'm not fond of entertaining either so off to restaurants I go.

Gallery Hyun is a wine and art gallery / Italian restaurant in the alley of Samcheongdong. Besides the hall floors where artwork is on display among the tables, a separate room with a terrace on the top floor and a private table setting in the "cave" (wine cellar) are also available. The view from the terrace is quite lovely, overlooking the Samcheong area and mountains in the background.

We had a light dinner course.

A juicy roasted sweet potato half is served instead of a heavy bread basket.

Grilled pine mushrooms with salad and vinaigrette.

Asparagus with a hint of pumpkin soup.

Simple pasta with spicy heat.

Tomato salad with balsamic sauce.

Mango sherbet as chaser.

Lamb chop with yuzu and mint jelly.
I absolutely love the lamb they serve here. Perfectly cooked. Not too fatty, not too lean.

Dessert: mini meringue, "sturdy" pudding and ice cream.

Had an American pinot noir with the meal; I'm trying to overcome my French wine bias.
They have a great wine list and the staff are well informed.

I appreciate how casual this place is without losing a formal atmosphere. It's not overun by college kids trying to impress their dates nor young career women trying out the trendiest new thing. The staff are friendly and approachable, too.

Gallery Hyun
http://www.galleryhyun.com/

Reservations needed
Tel : 02-722-0701