Category: Food

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[the taste of summer]

There are certain flavors that I will always associate with summer: fresh blackberries hot from the sun and picked straight from the vine, chocolate milkshakes like my grandmother used to make when my best friend and I would watch Scooby Doo, ice-cold lemonade.

For Koreans, the flavor of summer is apparently naengmyeon (냉면), or cold buckwheat noodles. Today the New York Times profiles this chewy treat, which I have to admit I never liked. Lately my colleague Young has been trying to convince me to give it another shot, so I will soon be indulging in this peculiar Korean dish once again. Hopefully Kang Suh, which she says is the restaurant to go to, will do a better job than the hole-in-the-wall student eatery near Daehagno in Seoul where I developed my current dislike.

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[korean cuisine]


“Heaven knows, I have eaten a lot of unusual things, but I found these little fellas terrifying.” That is food writer Stefan Gates’s take on Beondegi (번데기), or boiled silkworm larvae, a popular Korean snack. The photo and comment are part of his “search for the ultimate edible challenge,” as documented by the BBC. Other Korean culinary delights include sea slugs and dried frog tea.

It’s features like these that make me envy those friends of mine who have become obsessed with Italy or France. Of all the countries in the world to snare my passions, why did it have to be the one that thinks larvae are a tasty treat for the kiddies?

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[cookin’ with nanta]

The Korean show Cookin’, also known as Nanta, has arrived in New York City for an open-ended run. We saw this in Seoul and had a blast. Here’s the writeup from AOL CityGuide New York:

If the Food Network’s ‘Iron Chef’ show married Broadway’s ‘Stomp’, this would be their wacky offspring. Direct from Seoul, South Korea to the Minetta Lane Theatre comes an hour of gustatory excitement called ‘Cookin’.’ Four chefs are given a simple mission by a frenzied maitre d’: Prepare an entire feast (and a wedding banquet, no less) in only one hour, all while accompanied by strains of jazz, rock and Korean music. That’s a 60-minute non-stop music-and-food extravaganza as these kitchen masters use up nearly every single utensil in search of the perfect rhythm and combine cooking and traditional Korean Samulnori drumming. At the end of the show, they will have managed to prepare a meal of dumplings, soup and stir-fry, but it’s the process that makes this worth watching. Knives pound on the chopping block, broomsticks metamorphose into fighting tools, plates soar and fruit turn into madcap projectiles and juggling props. Best of all, some fortunate audience members will have the opportunity to taste the results; a lucky pair will even be in on the act, starring as the bride and groom, Ms. Lee and Mr. Kim.

As the white guy in the audience, I got picked to be Mr. Kim, and I married a sweet young Korean woman whose name I never got. But I still have a picture of myself in the silly hat the Cookin’ people strapped to my head.