Posts tagged ‘Food’
This morning I was hungry. I decided to combine what I had lying around.
I think I stumbled on the most sacrilegious meal ever.
Matzoh+bacon+scrambled eggs+cheese:
If you have any ideas on how to make this meal more offensive, do let me know. I figure pork on matzoh gets me pretty far though….
Back from Korea!
All of my good pictures are on Facebook – go see them here:
http://cli.gs/79WdDz – day 1
http://cli.gs/yY10Dy – day 2
http://cli.gs/7gYJjX – day 3
http://cli.gs/7DhG3d – day 4
http://cli.gs/4UQhQA – day 5
http://cli.gs/uMep0b – day 6
http://cli.gs/ZYah26 – day 7
http://cli.gs/6SrEM0 – day 8
http://cli.gs/Ny2Pqz – day 9
However, in the interest of using this webspace a bit more, I’ll post a bit of a documentary-style narrative here.
When I have more energy.
~Chris
Steak is awesome, and chicken sucks.
That is all.
So I spent the last couple days on the other coast. I haven’t spent any time in California since maybe a decade ago (ish?), so it was good to go back and see the sights that I’d enjoyed as a kid.
Alcatraz. In Arabic it means..."The Catraz". (Not really.)
Continue reading ‘Chocolate, waffles, and awesome times were ALL had!’ »
It’s a lazy beautiful Sunday. It’s unfortunate that it’s dark out this early, but really, it’s still February…what should I expect? It was in the 50s and 60s today though, so I won’t complain about it getting dark early.
Anyway, I spent most of the day studying for the LSAT. I’m going to take it again in June to raise my score, because frankly it wasn’t good enough to compete with most people. I scored a 166 on the diagnostic, so we’ll see how high I can go with it (and how high I can keep it)!
After a few hours at the library, I decided that I needed some soy sauce (since my old stuff started to go funny…), so I went out to Super H Mart. H-Mart (aka Han Ah Reum) is a Korean grocery chain endemic to this area – there are a couple elsewhere, but I think it started in Northern Virginia. I’m not sure what the difference is between a “Super” H-Mart and a normal H-Mart, but whatever.
Anyhoo, I realized that I had some pork in the freezer, so I decided on a meal for the night. It was quick, easy, semi-healthy (well, moreso than what I could have eaten otherwise…) and cheap.
The finished product!
The process follows below!
I was in a sweet mood. I went downstairs to my apartment’s convenience store and got both a package of Double Stuf Oreo and a single Klondike bar.
For some dumb reason, I looked at the nutrition facts for the Klondike bar. If you want to preserve your happiness, stop reading right now.
…….
SERIOUSLY.
Today I’m staying at home. I was thinking of going into the Office, but last night I was convinced to stay at home and work here. I can print out everything I need to, and do work from home. I can’t count hours, but I can get work done…which I have quite a bit of.
I decided that if I was going to stay home, I wanted some hot cocoa in the morning. So I went to Harris Teeter for some mix.
I saw something there that I always notice, and it somewhat depresses me each time.
It's like this EVERY TIME.
Now you might be saying “Chris, what if you just caught them in between refills, and this is that rare time where they’ve refilled the lowfat cookies but not the sugar ones!” To that I say “Fine, but I’ve been to Harris Teeter dozens of times…and it’s ALWAYS like this.” It’s like people don’t even see the lowfat ones!
I’ve tested both. Can’t tell the difference. They could switch the labels and see absolutely no difference in people’s choices.
Anyway, time to do work. Just wanted to vent about that.
~Chris
Hi there!
It’s 9:35am on the east coast, but it doesn’t feel like that to me. I don’t know what time it really is, but something called “the sun” seems to be out, and it’s in the eastern sky, so therefore it must be morning. Right? Right.
Anyway, I have a few more pictures, both from Everland from my day of travel.
Took a few more pictures of North Korea.
North Korea's right there!
Closer shot of North Korea.
We made it to Caribbean Bay! (Warning: Overly excited English ahead.) It was a water park, mostly indoors. I realize I said “outdoors” before, but there was an outdoor portion of the lazy river part. I had to retouch this photo since it was really really white.
Outside Caribbean Bay! Woo!
INSIDE Caribbean Bay! See the difference?
There’s a water slide, a few wade pools, the lazy river, a kiddie diving pool, strictly kiddie pools, and a bunch of saunas/spas. It was a relaxing place filled with hundreds of screaming Korean kids.
On the way out, I found a few gifts and took a picture of the theme park’s entrance.
There was also a theme park next to Caribbean Bay. It was open for a "Snow Festival".
We took the bus back to Ilsan, and I found the best Billiard Club in the world. Kind of far to travel, but it’s gotta be worth it.
I found the best billiard club in the world, FYI.
Dinner was Kimbab, Udon noodles, and Jook. I only got a picture of the Kimbab.
Kimbab! Seaweed, rice, and meat+veggies.
That was my last day and night in Korea. The next day was all travel.
Woke up early, and headed to the airport. As I said, my complaint letter to Delta got me a free BusinessElite upgrade. A very nice touch for the 13 hour Incheon-Atlanta leg.
Sonia holding the ticket of AWESOME.
This upgrade was key. A 13-hour flight in Coach isn’t too bad – the food’s decent, I had an exit-row seat, and the amenities were pretty good too. But man….BusinessElite is so excellent. If you don’t know, you really don’t know. Take a gander:
The seatback in Business Class on Delta's 777s.
I sat in one of those seats. They didn’t quite lie totally flat, but reclined maybe to a 30º angle. The footrest also came up to about 75º. They also included a bottle of water, an amenity kit with all sorts of stuff, and a light that you can see on the left side for reading.
Slippers from BusinessElite on Delta.
Oh yeah, slippers too.
Business Class also had better food. Dinner...number 1? Pictured: Beef Japchae, Carrot and Ginger Soup, and a Fresh Seasonal Salad.
The food wasn’t bad either. I missed taking a picture of the first dinner (lunch? breakfast? midnight snack? what time was it?), but it was a “Penne Pasta in Vegetable Bolognese Sauce, tossed with arugula, fresh mozzarella, and mushrooms”.
Dinner #2's main course. I chose the Tuk Galbi - "traditional korean beef in spicy soy sauce with mushrooms, pak choi, and steamed rice".
I tried to talk my way into the Delta lounge in Atlanta with my Business Class ticket, but no dice. I paid for it since I REALLY wanted a shower.
The flight after was lackluster, we’ll say, in comparison. But it landed safely. That’s all I really care about.
Pretty simple day today!
Waiting for the bus, I was struck by how large the roads are...mostly because they're never busy enough to merit their size.
We went to a small restaurant called “Urban Garden“, hidden in a back alley near 서울시청 (Seoul City Hall). It was a pretty nice place, and the food was carefully prepared. Their website is annoying as hell though; turn off your speakers.
Hi Yewon!
We met Yewon for lunch! I hadn’t seen her since October, and Sonia hadn’t seen her since May. It’s good to know Columbia didn’t kill her.
Their menu might need a little bit of work.
After lunch, we traveled back to the house, and got ready for dinner.
Dinner layout! Wrap the eel in the vegetables, add your choice of condiments, and eat!
Now it’s off to the water park. Yes, I know, it’s about 10˚F colder here than Jersey. We’ll see how this goes.
Short entry, yes, I know, but I’m excited to swim in really cold weather 
~Chris
We went out yesterday and Sunyoung wanted me to try a Korean/Chinese/Something dish called 자짱면 (Jajjyeongmyeon). It is a true Korean dish, invented by Chinese immigrants about a century ago, and historically eaten on highschool/college graduation day.
Jajjangmyeon, a dish with wheat noodles, black soybean paste sauce, some meat, and veggies. Salty but good!
The place was huge, and fairly nicely decorated. I won’t attempt to be a judge of authentic Chinese restaurants, but it looked nice inside nonetheless.
After that, Sunyoung remembered that I had to try 두유 (Korean soymilk), so we found a convenience store and asked for directions to the 남산 케이블카 (Namsan Cable Car). (Note, link to company doesn’t work. Try Web Archive.)
Korean soymilk - with chestnut flavor!
While drinking his soymilk, Chris finds a ridiculous CD rate, and plots to send some money to Korea in the future. From what I can tell, that's a 1-year CD rate. W. T. F.
It was a 3 minute ride up the side of Namsan, at which point we could see the Seoul Tower (previously the “Namsan Tower”).
Shot of the city. Higher and higher we go...
우리은행, aka "Our Bank". Don't mess with Koreans.
Another shot from wayyy up.
The other cable car passed us. No-one waved 
Panorama of Seoul
After the ride up, we were at the top of Namsan (aka Mount Nam).
There’s a little museum, a restaurant arrogantly called “The Place” (which brought on a lot of bad jokes from me), and a gift shop.
Tree of teddy bears!
Wireframe man flying around the Tower.
There was also a demonstration going on. Apparently the new administration invoked some harsh rules upon the news media, and some of the news unions were protesting in a memorable way:
Up....
Up....
And Away!
A pretty good shot if I do say so myself.
We took a few shots of the panorama on the other side of the mountain:
The other side of Seoul. Not in a bad way. Just geographically different.
We also participated in a tradition on the Seoul Tower; cheesy, yes; but such is life.
I think it started from a TV show? Anyway, it was cute, and I have the key. So I can unlock our love if I get tired of it 
Namdaemun market. A sea of people and cheap stuff. Oh, and street food vendors.
Namdaemun is an experience. An experience we mostly missed out on since places were closing at the time.
We made it back to Myeongdong to find dinner. At night it's a cornucopia of lights and sounds, quite pretty. And no cars!
Dinner was a Korean restaurant, known as 버거킹.
Some things never change, no matter where you go...right?
You people (Americans) might know it by its traditional name, “Burger King”.
Whenever I go to another country, I love seeing that country’s take on American fastfood. In the same way that Chinese food in America is a perversion of real Chinese food, seeing the Korean version of Burger King was interesting because it’s one of the many impressions that we give off.
Also, it’s interesting to see how Koreans enjoy their food, as evidenced by our dinner.
Honey Potato burger. It was a mashed potato on top of a burger, topped with honey.
Potato burger + honey = interesting. It was kind of sweet, but not overly so. Could have done without the mayo.
ANGRY WHOPPER. This was awesome.
According to Wikipedia, this is already around the world, and not just a Korean thing. But I didn’t taste the pepperjack cheese or jalapenos. Actually kind of tasted like kimchi. Pretty awesome either way though!
That was my day! Time to wake up and have breakfast. We’re meeting a friend today, and I don’t know what else yet. Rest assured I’ll get pictures this time.
~Chris
