Subject: Korean Report Week 14
I'm approaching the end of my stay in Korea, so you will only be getting a couple more reports.
This week’s report mostly relates to food. Bon appetite!
KOREAN GREETINGS
When you meet someone, you are greeted with a typical Good Morning, Good Afternoon … but one of
the typical parts of the greeting also includes “Have you eaten?” And, if you’re trying to skip some meals or
only have yogurt for lunch, forget it; do not tell your host, because you must eat. Eating three meals a day is
vitally important and is part of being Korean. It seems to me that these tiny people eat generously at three
meals a day but they stay slim. Of course, they do not typically consume rich desserts and the diet is
primarily fish, rice, kimchi, and vegetables. Often a cup of tea or a cup of coffee is dessert. Once I was served
a liquid yogurt to mix with some sugary powder for a dessert in a Korean whole foods restaurant.
TRADITIONAL KOREAN RESTAURANTS
One time I was taken to lunch at a traditional Korean restaurant in Daegu that Koreans go to for special
occasions like birthdays, anniversaries, or having an American friend come visit. Here the servers were
dressed in the traditional hanbok dresses with full skirts and short jackets. We removed our shoes (typical in
all Korean restaurants), entered a small room with rice paper doors for privacy, sat on the floor on mats in
front of the low table, and were served at least 20 dishes of food (no exaggeration!) which were shared by
the three adults in our party. The dishes included raw blowfish (yes, blowfish is poisonous as you all probably
know from the Simpsons; I ate it and I am still alive!) with salad greens, octopus with vegetables, dried fish,
duck, steamed pork, pumpkin with mashed potato, green onion pancake, tofu, pumpkin soup, kimchi, rice,
sticky rice cakes, kelp, and many other dishes.
I have been taken to soup restaurants where soup is prepared in front of you in a bowl that is on a
burner on the table. Other restaurants have burners built into the tables and special pans are inserted into
the recessed burner opening so that meat can be cooked at the table. Typically, the server monitors this
cooking process and cuts the meat with scissors. I have had a wonderful beef dish called bulgogi as well as a
barbequed pork dish called samgyeopsal. The strips of samgyeopsal are placed in a lettuce leaf with some
spicy sauce. Yummy!
When I was in Gyeongju, my four Korean professor friends took me to lunch in another traditional
Korean restaurant. We were directed to a private room that had cushions for us on the floor, but there was
no table. I said: “Shouldn’t there be a table?” Then a table was carried in by two servers who just set the
food-laden table in front of us. Foods included octopus, squid, shark, fish, shrimp, pork slices, barbequed
pork, and a variety of banchon (side dishes), including kimchi, of course + a rice bowl for each of us as well as
a bowl of kelp soup for each of us. Later rice soup was delivered and then a sweet rice drink was delivered
for dessert. I did take one bite of the shark, but it was very salty and reminded me of the salted cod that I had
eaten in Nova Scotia.
HOME-COOKED KOREAN SPAGHETTI
I spent a day and the night in Daegu with Dr. Paek at her condo. She made spaghetti for supper. I
thought that you might enjoy the recipe.
1 package of spaghetti noodles, cooked and drained
Sauce:
Finely chop and then sauté in a frying pan with margarine: carrots, onions, mushrooms, and hot peppers
Add: tomatoes and salt
Stir in: small slices of cuttlefish
Add: curry---lots of curry; stir
Spoon over noodles and serve with wine.
For dessert: frozen banana slices and fresh kiwi
KOREAN TEA SERVICE
One of my graduate students, Myung-a, brought her teapot, cups, and bowls to campus and performed a
Korean Tea Service for me and the other graduate students in my office. First she set out all the required
equipment, but she apologized that she could not bring the official tea table with her. She described the tea
table as having a breakable ceramic top and sitting low to the floor. The green and cream ceramic tea set
was composed of one medium-size bowl, another bowl that was a bit smaller with a lip on it, a teapot with
lid, a teapot lid holder, five small tea cups that looked like small bowls since they did not have handles, and
five saucers. The ceremony began with filling the large bowl with boiling water. She then cleaned the cups
by pouring boiling water into them. Then she poured boiling water into the lipped bowl. This is the cooling
bowl. She waited for the water to reach the perfect temperature of 70 degrees Celsius. (No, she didn’t have
a thermometer; she just knew when it was the perfect temperature since she performs this tea service with
her husband and 10-year-old daughter two or three times per week.) While the water was cooling, she
placed leafs of green tea in the teapot, which had a spout on one side and a long, hollow handle on the other
side. When it was time, she poured the water over the tea leafs. After a very short time of brewing, the tea
was poured into each of our cups. We cradled the cups in our left hands and supported them on the open
palm of our right hands. Then we were told to smell the tea, then drink the tea by taking three sips, and then
smell the empty cup. This process was repeated three times. It was very relaxing. Myung-a said that the tea
ceremony is a time for families to be together to relax and talk about their days together. It was beautiful! I
am so lucky that so many people are willing to share their culture and themselves with me.
RICE, RICE, and more RICE
There is not a rice shortage in Korea and that is a good thing because rice is served at every meal. It
almost always is served as sticky rice. Sometimes it has some vegetables in it. Sometimes it is a
pinkish/purplish color. Sometimes it is served as a watery breakfast cereal. Sometimes at the end of a meal,
if there is rice left over, water is added and it becomes dessert. I have eaten bibimbap which is rice with
vegetables and a fried egg on top. Spicy red sauce is often served with this. For this dish, you use a spoon to
thoroughly mix all the ingredients together before eating it with the same spoon. I have also been served a
homemade rice juice, which is rice that is cooked, then fermented overnight with some water and sweetener,
and then chilled. It is served traditionally at weddings or used as a summer drink, so I think it is the lemonade
of South Korea. When Rachael & I were in Seoul, we stopped to get something to drink before visiting the
palace. I picked a white liquid just to experiment with something new. Wouldn’t you know it? It was rice
juice! When I went to Gyeongju with the four professors, we stopped on the way back to Hayang to get
drinks and a snack. Can you guess what the snack was? Rice cakes! And, if you are an American who doesn’t
want to eat rice (or kimchi) for three meals a day, then the cafeteria cops (a.k.a. cafeteria ladies) notice that
you have forgotten to put those two staples on your tray and they take your tray away from you and give you
some. Or if you have snuck through the line without the cafeteria ladies catching you, then some student sits
next to you and says: “Where is your rice?” I think it is a sin at the Catholic University of Daegu to not eat
rice. Mea culpa.
PIZZA ---KOREAN STYLE:
Domino’s Pizza is not quite the same in Korea as it is in the U.S., but they do deliver. Imagine a thin crust
pizza, covered in some yellowish cheese/mashed corn paste instead of mozzarella cheese, without tomato
sauce, but with Canadian bacon and potato. The pizza comes with a little cup of sweet pickles and good old
Coca Cola. It tasted good! I understand that there is also a yummy sweet potato pizza.
CORN ICE CREAM
When Rachael and I were in the DMZ, after we ate a Korean meal for lunch, we stopped in the gift shop
(Yes, there are gift shops in the DMZ!) and I purchased a unique dessert. It was an ice cream treat that
looked like an ear of corn, smelled like an ear of corn, and somewhat tasted like corn. The ice-cream conelike texture that served as a shell over the ice cream on the stick was formed into an ear-of-corn shape. So, I
guess the moral of this story is: You can take the woman out of the Midwest, but you can’t take the Midwest
out of the woman. Maybe Iowa needs to invest in this product!
KOREAN FAST FOOD
While in Seoul, I got to experience a McDonald’s and a Burger King (which they sometimes misspell and
label as Buger King in ads). At both McDonald’s and Burger King, one can order bulgogi burgers instead of
hamburgers. The McDonald’s menu also features shrimp burgers, spicy chicken tenders, a Big Tasty which is
a bulgogi burger with tomato, and a cup of corn for salad. I have eaten at KFC in Hayang. The menu is mostly
sandwiches, which include bulgogi burgers and shrimp burgers as well as some chicken sandwiches. I didn’t
see any pictures of KFC mini banquets but I did see some pictures of buckets of chicken on the menu
selection board or some combinations of chicken pieces for meals. And it appears that only extra crispy
chicken is available. It may be chicken, but it has different spices so it doesn’t quite taste like KFC. By the
way, have you heard that recently there have been several cases of Avian Flu in Korea? So, I am not eating
chicken at KFC anymore. (Do any of you remember that when I went to Thailand, there was a SARS
outbreak? Now I am in Korea for an Avian Flu outbreak. I’m beginning to think that I personally attract
deadly epidemics.)
AT THE OFFICE: ORDERING FOOD IN
In the U.S. we might order in pizza for delivery, but in Korea, one can order a traditional Korean meal
that is delivered to your office door. For about 7.000 won (@$7), one can get a meal for two that includes
two large bowls of bibimbap, two bowls of soup, and a variety of banchon: separate dishes of anchovies,
fish, vegetable pancakes, tofu, kimchi, sweet potato noodles, macaroni salad, etc…When the delivery person
arrives, he leaves a large plastic bowl in which to place your emptied dishes when you are done. This pan full
of dirty dishes is placed out in the hall near a garbage can, covered with an old newspaper, and the delivery
person returns later to pick up the dishes. Oh, and there is no tipping allowed in Korea.
KOREAN AFTER-DINNER SNACK
When I traveled to Busan with the Mississippi State University students, we stopped for dinner on our
way home. I couldn’t help but notice that one of the Mississippi State Students looked a little greenish at the
site of Korean food. She said that she just couldn’t do it. So she went to a snack bar at this stop and bought
what she thought was Cheetos---nope, not cheetos, but another crunchy snack. The rest of us ate whatever
foods our Korean partners brought to us. After the meal, most of the MSU students bought ice cream for
dessert, but one of the Korean students bought a small fried squid for dessert! You can imagine how his
American female partner, who was eating ice cream next to him on the bus, reacted to his after-dinner
dessert snack! And you can imagine how fried squid smelled on a bus. Cultural differences.
EATING DOG
No, to my knowledge, I have not eaten dog. But, frankly, much of what is served to me is “mystery
meat” or “mystery fish”. The benefits of eating dog: improving virility, improving women's skin, as a cure for
summer heat, for those suffering from an illness, and for those recovering from an illness. When they kill the
dog, it is best to hang the dog from a tree and beat it to death to properly tenderize the meat. I have heard
that they mostly use large dogs like German shepherds for food. Most dogs in Korea are quite small, wear
little outfits, and are kept in cages most of the time. (This information is from what I have heard from
western friends and from the internet.) So, if you plan to visit Korea, I recommend that you leave Fido home.
Linda Good, Ph.D.
Professor
Early Childhood Education Coordinator