Our Korean Journey (the Overview)

Allison and I lately received again from a visit to Korea, and boy are we full. We picked this vacation spot for a trip for a number of causes. The cool climate (we dwell in a spot that’s scorching on a regular basis), the attention-grabbing tradition, however the meals was most definitely on our record of causes as properly. Our information earlier than leaving was pretty restricted, we knew about kimchie, Korean barbecue, and we additionally knew there was some western eating places as properly.

 Since we dwell in a spot that’s type of reduce off from western type
eating places, after we journey we have a tendency to combine it up between the native
meals and western eating places. Some folks remark to me after I
journey that I waste my time at locations like McDonald’s and Shake
Shack, however we don’t have them the place we dwell, so it’s a pleasant deal with
to eat one thing western for us.

The one factor we didn’t anticipate in Korea is espresso and cafes. To say that Koreans cherished espresso is an understatement. Starbucks is completely in every single place, and there are much more native espresso outlets on prime of that. The native espresso outlets typically have a big bakery half as properly, with each conventional French type treats and a few hybrid Korean/French. These bakeries/cafes had been nice for us if we wished a fast lunch or a snack on the go. It was at all times protected to know that if we didn’t really feel like consuming one thing within the space, a restaurant would have a easy sandwich or candy deal with to munch on.

You possibly can’t discuss Korea with out speaking about kimchi. It was just about out there in every single place. Even among the western locations provide a kimchi model of their traditional meals. At nearly each Korean meal (together with breakfast at our lodges) we had kimchi provided to us. At the entire markets each small and native to the fanciest boutiques, kimchi was on the market. I’d prefer to say that I went loopy consuming the stuff, however I simply couldn’t have presumably tried it at each flip, it was simply an excessive amount of.

Korean barbecue can be value mentioning, it’s just about in every single place. We did discover that there have been completely different kinds of eating places, some higher suited to vacationers than others. Within the excessive vacationer areas there have been Korean barbecue locations that appeared very touristy with large posters of meat cooking within the home windows, in addition to folks out entrance doing every little thing of their energy to get you into the restaurant. There have been additionally very fancy trying locations, typically embellished to look quaint. These locations would at all times promote the standard of the meat, and ensure not a single worth was proven on any signal or menu. Lastly there have been locations that hardly appeared like eating places in any respect, they might have shiny lights and be very crowded. They appeared very native, and barely intimidating for anybody who may not communicate Korean.

When speaking about Korean treats and sweet, it looks as if the package deal is value as a lot because the sweet itself, typically extra. On the time we went, there have been at the least 4 cross promotions with varied Okay-pop bands and sure treats. It will imply your favorite Okay-pop begin can be on the promoting and infrequently the package deal of your favorite deal with. There have been additionally a number of cross promotions with varied cartoon characters too. It made for attention-grabbing promoting, however one factor I seen is that they not often if ever really made a particular deal with for these promotions. For essentially the most half they had been simply adorning a pre-existing sweet with the newest fashionable particular person or character. The sweet and sweets themselves had been nice, with lots of a cross over from Japanese flavours and developments (though I received’t say who had it first much less I begin a giant debate).

We had a very nice time in Korea, we received the cool climate we had been hoping for, we noticed some lovely palaces and temples, and boy did we eat. One factor I seen concerning the Korean folks is that lots of them didn’t communicate English, however it by no means stopped them from being outgoing and tremendous pleasant. A lot of our greatest meals experiences had been tied to the folks round us and that made issues style just a bit bit higher.