Play with Culture Cooking Contest at Culcom in Sinchon

Last Saturday, we were invited by a friend to Culture Complex (CulCom) near Sinchon Station, to compete in a cooking competition/ cultural exchange organized by a group called Play with Culture. Of course, the boyfriend, being quite the culinary artist, jumped at the opportunity to prove his skills in the kitchen. So, we found ourselves in CulCom's lounge at 4pm, partnered with other Koreans and foreigners in group #6, preparing to prove our culinary skills.

 

Playing the ladder game to choose a recipe

After finding our group and getting to know each other a little bit, the event organizers explained the rules of the contest. Each team would be randomly assigned a recipe by doing the ladder game. Some forigners were a little confused by this, but eventually we got it all settled and each team was assigned one recipie. We got chap chae. Other teams were assigned Royal Dukbokki, Haemul Pajeon, Dalkdoritang, sujaebi, and sundubu jjigae. We were a little nervous about our chap chae since it is quite hard to make and involves a lot of preparation.

So Mi asking questions, winners get extra money for their team

The next part was getting money to buy ingredients. While each team was given 30,000 won as a base amount to buy ingredients, you could win extra cash for your team by competing in some games. After several attempts, we finally one game... and got a whopping extra 2,000 won.

Next, the participants were given 2 hours to do all the shopping, cook the entire dish and clean up. We all went racing to the supermarket to buy supplies. Our team members wanted to have a dish that was not only pleasant to eat, but also was also visually appealing. With our 32,000 won budget we were able to choose very colorful vegetables like red, yellow peppers (also known as "paprika" in Korea), bell peppers, onions, carrots and spinach. And we bought an expensive (meaning 2,000 won) bottle of makkoli, too, since we still had extra money. And we still had nearly 10,000 won left at the end... what happened to that money?

 

Preparing the Spinach

Very colorful assortment of vegetables

Me, cutting meat with an enormous knife...

A shy team member boiling noodles for the chap chae

Then it was time to go back and cook. We didn't expect it to take so long just to prepare the basic ingredients. Working with limited utensils, cutting boards, pots and pans, it took us the full time to cook our dish. The boyfriend instructed all of us culinarily (is that a word?) inept team members exactly how to cut each of the vegetables, how to marinate the beef, and how to fry the vegetables. But, with his help, we started to make some progress.

Frying vegetables

The final stir

Chap Chae, the noodles themselves, need to be fried together with all the veggies and soy sauce once everything is prepared. Having one, medium sized frying pan was certainly a challenge, but the boyfriend skillfully alternated frying one half at a time until it was perfect. As we were tasting it before it was done frying, we started to have our doubts about our work. It was too salty... it was tasteless... we started eying the other group's work wondering if it would be possible to win. But, once we were done frying everything and we gave it one last stir.... we realized it was perfect. There was no way we could lose the contest.

 

Introducing the judging part of the competition

 

Sample cups for passersby to taste

In order to avoid bias from judging within our own members, each team prepared small sample cups to bring outside for passersby to taste. While the group organizers took everything to the streets, we stayed in, tasting a little bit of everyone's food. Some groups were better than others... some were completely indistinguishable from what they were supposed to be making (that's not to say they didn't taste good... but...) but other groups had done pretty darn well. We started to get a little worried. But, the free makkoli that started coming out from the back room made us quickly forget that.

 

Group #6, the winners!

Celebrating victory with a box of Manoffins

After about 20 minutes, the organizers came back from the streets with the results from the taste tests. And who do you think won? Of course, team #6, our amazing team lead by my amazing chef. We were presented with our grand prize... a box of 6 muffins from Manoffin. Well, the prize wasn't much to show, but we had the glory of knowing we were the best chefs in the room.

Immortalizing the prize winning chap chae

The Recipe: 

1 package of fresh spinach

1 medium sized carrot

1 onion

1 red pepper

1 yellow pepper 

1 green pepper

1 package of mushrooms

100g of beef

1 bag of sweet potato glass noodles

soy sauce

sesame seed oil

sesame seeds

cooking oil (vegetable oil, grape seed oil, etc)

(other vegetables as desired)

Cut all vegetables and meat into thin medium sized strips. Put the meat in a marinade of soy sauce (add oyster sauce to the marinade for extra goodness). Saute the mushrooms in soy sauce for several minutes. Boil the spinach for a few minutes. Add a little soy sauce and sesame seed oil to the boiled spinach to taste. Fry onion, peppers, and carrot together in a frying pan with a little soy sauce. Fry marinated beef separately. Boil the noodles until soft. Wash and rinse noodles thoroughly under cold water for several minutes. In a bowl, add cooking oil to the noodles and mix thoroughly. Fry noodles in a frying pan with soy sauce, to taste. Fry for several minutes, but don't allow the noodles to burn. Remove from heat and add the fried vegetables, meat, spinach and mushrooms to the noodles. Mix. Add more soy sauce if needed, add some sesame seed oil to taste and sprinkle sesame seeds on top. Enjoy! 

Not hard, but it is a little time intensive! Good luck! If you try this recipe, blog about it and leave a link here! 

For more events run by Culture Complex, join their facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/culcom?ref=ts&__adt=3&__att=iframe

The ad which got us interested in the event:

And the official video from the event:

Backstreets of Insadong and Wonderful Hanjeongsik

One of Seoul's top tourist destinations is a little street near Jongno called Insadong. Nearly every tourist to Seoul makes at least one stop here during their trip. While tourists usually spend their time on the main street discovering art shops, souvenir shops, art galleries and tea shops, I have discovered that Insadong's back alleys are really where it's at. Sneaking down some of the barely noticeable side alleys will bring you to some quite unexpected surprises.

One day I decided to take a trip around the snaking back alleys to see what I could find. There were lots of little, hidden restaurants and interesting looking pubs that were still closed since it was daytime.

Daesong Hanjeongsik Restaurant

The second time I went, I took the boyfriend with me and we decided to find a restaurant to eat lunch at back here somewhere. We settled on this Hanjeongsik restaurant. Hanjeongsik is a traditional style Korean meal which consists mainly of many small side dishes (panchan) and a few bigger dishes like jjigae, fish or meat to accompany them. Hanjeongsik tends to be quite expensive, but at this restaurant, the price was just 10,000 won per person for lunch. Take a look at some of what we had:

 Sigeumchi Namul

Sigeumchi Namul, or spinach in English, is one of the most common side dishes you can see in Korea after kimchi and radish. This is one of my favorites. It's served cold or at room temperature and after it is boiled down, it is seasoned with a little soy sauce, garlic and a touch of sesame oil and sesame seeds.

Baek Kimchi

Baek Kimichi, or white kimchi is less common than the normal, spicy kimchi, but it is another popular side dish, especially with hanjeongsik. Though it is made with cabbage, much like the kimchi we all know and love, it is not spicy at all. It is made with salt, garlic, ginger, and often times some pear juice as well.

Biji in a stone pot, with other side dishes including onions, anchovies and cucumber

Biji is not too common to see in Korean restaurants, but it is a super healthy food. It's made from the insoluble parts of the soybean after tofu is made. Therefore, it's really high in fiber and protein. The consistency is kind of similar to cream of wheat, which we often eat in America. On it's own, it doesn't have much taste, but together with the rest of the side dishes, it's lovely.

Pajeon and boiled pork to the right

Pajeon is a scallion pancake. The bowl in the middle is full of soy sauce for dipping. The fat of the boiled pork might be off putting to some foreigners, but I was pleasantly surprised when I bit in. It was super soft and tasted marvelous. You can also dip it in the sewoojeot, or sauce made from tiny shrimp for extra flavor.

 Doenjang jjigae with rice with garlic cloves

And what Korean meal would be complete without some jjigae? Doengjang jjigae is a stew made from a bean paste. It's full of tofu, zucchini, onions among other vegetables as well. 

 

Next time you're in Insadong, be sure to head down some back alleys to find Insadong's greatest treasures! 

Tower Condo and Spring Skiing

On Saturday, March 24th, we hopped in the car after work and drove up to Yongpyong, our usual winter destination. While Seoul at that time was starting to feel slightly warmer, Hoenggye, the town at the base of Yongpyeong still had plenty of snow to be had. Another storm had just dropped more snow in the area the day before and we were looking forward to an amazing day of skiing on Sunday.

Kitchen in Tower Condo

When the ski season is still in full swing, booking condos at the resort can be difficult. And expensive of course. Fortunately, we (ahm, aka the boyfriend) bought a condo membership this year, so a night at any of the condos around the resort starts at 70,000 a night instead of around 200,000 per night. So, that took care of the cost. Booking, especially last minute tends to be difficult, but since it was the end of the year we were able to call on the way there and get a room in Tower Condo.

Tower Condo

As the olympics are coming in the next few years, I've been trying to document every place to stay around Yongpyong. So, here's what a basic room in Tower Condo looks like. This is, of course, an ondol room which means there's no bed, just floor mats. Nowadays I sleep on the floor more often than in my own bed so this is nothing strange to me.

Tower Condo

There is a small kitchen with an electric stove with two burners. Unfortunately the sink was seriously blocked which made cooking our spagetti dinner a little difficult.

Bathroom in Tower Condo

The bathroom was nice. No tub in this condo, but it had a nice big shower stall. To see other Yongpyong accomodations, along with other info about Yongpyong, click here.

And as for the skiing? It was great, of course, just like it was at this time last year. Spring skiing in Yongpyeong is usually great! We skied the whole day in beautiful powdery conditions.

Korea Blog WKB Welcoming Event, 3/23/2012

Jessica Steele, author of ROKin' Around Korea being interviewed by Arirang News

As you may know, I'm one of the "Worldwide Korea Bloggers" for The Korea Blog. The nice thing about blogging for the Korea Blog is the opportunity to take parts in various cultural events around Korea. I've been invited on many trips, including a trip to Jeju last year, but it seems I only ever have time to fit in the actual welcoming ceremonies that they hold each year due to my work schedule. On March 25th, they held a welcoming ceremony for the second batch of bloggers. Now there are 50 bloggers in Korea and around the world who contribute to this blog. When I walked in, I was a bit surprised to see Arirang News there on hand to document the event. You can see the whole press release here, including a video featuring an interview with me!

Asif Quadri, author of Adventures in Daegu and Beyond, who I met last year as well. 

We were asked to introduce ourselves and our blogs, all while being filmed by Arirang AND the Qi Ranger. Needless to say, I don't think I'll ever be able to be a celebrity. I lose what little ability I have to speak articulately once the camera is on me. Probably for the best, I suppose.

We even made the English Language Newspapers, page 20 of the Korea Herald on March 26th.

After the event at the KCOIS office, we hopped in a bus and headed over to the National Museum of Korea for a guided tour and an art lesson.

Anyone who wanted to film in the museum needed a press pass. I didn't want to film, but I just wanted to look special wearing one...

It was somewhere around this crown that I was interviewed. I kind of wanted to hear what the tour guide was saying, but I guess Arirang is more important..

I learned a bit more about Buddha statues from this tour, and I hope to blog on the topic more... if I ever have time to blog again, that is...

The last activity of the day was a painting activity. As this is the year of the dragon, we were taught how to paint a dragon. Actually, it mostly involved tracing, but I'll pretend that we're all really good artists for the sake of the blog. Mine came out pretty good, but unfortunately I was in a rush to get back to work for the night shift so I didn't really get to finish it properly.

You can learn more about the event from the Korea.net press release here, and see my blog posts from last year's event here and here. If you like the sound of becoming a blogger for the Korea blog, they'll probably be accepting more bloggers next year. It's a great opportunity and has inspired me to get out more and find exciting events to blog about. Now if only I had time to write....

Photo Walk through Dongmyo, Hwanghak-dong and the Seoul Folk Flea Market

 Dongmyo Shrine

I met a couchsurfer the other day to walk around town and take some photos. She said she wanted to see flea markets, so I figured what better place than my neighborhood? First stop was Dongmyo and the flea markets around there....

Used clothes in front of Dongmyo

 This whole backstreet sells only fabric

 Old school uniforms! Super cool!

From Dongmyo, it's only a 5 minute walk or so over to the Seoul Folk Flea Market. I've been here several times before, but it's always fun to have a fresh look. 

Military equipment and an old mail box

Antiques

 Korean traditional masks, I think...

Old cameras and seriously old cameras

 Antiques for sale in Hwangakdong

Then we crossed the Cheonggyechon into Hwanghak-dong, my neighborhood. It's always fun to walk through the flea markets over here. You'll never know what you'll find. 

Is there anything you can't find in Hwanghak-dong?

Maybe a new watch tickles your fancy?

Or maybe you're more into digital nowadays..

 Down a side street from Jungang Market

 Our last stop was a stroll through Jungang Market where I do a lot of my grocery shopping. I hate taking too many photos here since I don't want the vendors to get to know me as "that annoying weigukin with the camera", but sometimes I'm able to get a few good shots.

I'd like to take more photo walks around Seoul. Nowadays I tend to have a lot of free time in the afternoons, so if any readers would like to join me for a photo walk around town, please send me a message and maybe we can meet up to snap a few photos!