Oh! Hello, Doobies! Today we're in Seoul, a place I'm proud to call home, a city that makes my heart skip a beat. And for the next 72 hours, I am going to be your guide to Seoul so that you can see and experience my city like a true local. What you doing, baby girl?
Don't get lost in these poopy brown eyes. Let's go. I've been thinking, I've been thinking, I've been thinking, I've been thinking, thinking about you No matter how much I shake my head, I'm just thinking about you No matter how much I do something else, I can only hear your voice Oh, it's a moment here with me Oh, it's a moment here with me Is there a host?
Oppa! So a little pro tip, the entrance fee to the palaces are free if you're dressed in a traditional hanbok. So we're gonna rent out one and see you in a second.
Wait, this is not the place. This is my Devil Wes Prada moment. You're in desperate need of Chanel. Okay, you're gonna see me transform in 3, So this is a separate line for the Hanbok people and you get free admission but they don't let you like merge genders like if you're wearing a man's uniform you need to wear the man's uniform if you're wearing the woman's uniform you just need to wear the woman's uniform it's okay to cross dress but just know like mixing because they want to keep the outfits traditional makes you think what life would have been like a thousand years ago in Seoul and back then Korea had a different name called Joseon and it was called the Joseon dynasty So the thing that's special about Korean palisades is that it's kind of a weird embolization between Chinese and Japanese.
Like China, it's grand, it's a lot of colors, and Japan it's a lot of like black and white and very simple. kind of somewhere in between. We have the colors and we're very focused on detail.
You can see the, which is the flower that's on the totem poles. They're individually drawn and it's very much influenced by the Buddhist mentality of peace and harmony and all these colors of land water and fire coming all together to create balance. It's beautiful and those little statues you see on top of the roofs they're little guardians to protect you from fire so all these palace walls are made with wood and clay so it's prone to burning so these little totems to guard your houses from bad spirits and just bring you good luck. It's a temple for ants! So this is a restaurant that specializes in Buddhist cuisine and Buddhist cuisine means a lot of focus on seasonal local produce and vegetables.
So if you have friends that are visiting that have dietary restrictions or allergies or doesn't eat meat, this is a really great place to come that everyone can enjoy. Okay let's go over some of the foods. So here we have our black sesame porridge and this is a type of water kimchi. Gamtae, it's a type of algae. The official name for it is called Eclobia cava.
I just googled it, so not to sound like a smartass. Kelp with some gochujang that's sweet and sour. We have some wood ear mushrooms, cilantro, muchim, lotus root with orange marmalade, and you can see all the preserves on the side.
Also, the guy that's playing the piano is the owner of this place. Fun fact. The thing is, with Korean cuisine, whether or not it's Buddhist or not, banchan is a very big part of how we eat. So another very important aspect of Buddhist cuisine, the term is called paru gongyang. Means to eat everything on your plate because you don't want to be wasteful We have some soybean soup and this is like the ultimate Korean comfort food and we have all these namul So namul is a vegetable side dish.
We have some tofu some acorn jelly kimchi, lotus root, burdock, and inside here are forage vegetables. We are a mountainous region. We're covered by mountains and that means that it's hard to farm actually.
So due to that, foraging is a big part of Buddhist cuisine and eating seasonally and mindfully that's surrounding in your nature. But really a big metaphor as to how we should live and very integral part of the Buddhist mentality is to keep the harmony To not disturb the peace It's tea time bitches. Let's go.
So because this is a traditional Korean home, we always take shoes off before going in. And I know this sounds pretty foreign to a lot of people, but it's part of the experience. Ah.
and we sit on the floor because this is how people used to do back in the days. We would always sit with a little cushion and sit like this, like kind of kneeling down if you're a lady, but I'm no lady so I'm just gonna crisscross applesauce. mandatory when I was going to school for girls.
Sexist, I know, but it was a different era, okay? Wow. Green tea that's not bitter.
It's sweet. The aftertaste is incredibly nice and fresh. Sometimes when you have like matcha that's bad, it kind of leaves like a Dr. Seuss kind of cakey tongue, but this just had the after finish. Like the aftertaste is so nice and clean.
It's amazing. Moving on, we have Daechu Cha, which is Jujubee tea and it comes in kind of like a porridge consistency. Jujubee is naturally quite starchy and it's also very sugary.
This is the food that you would eat during the winter. especially to fight off a cold or if your immune is down. It's also been like a very much a royal luxurious type of food because jujube is super hard to grow. To describe the taste, it's a little thick, it's a little viscous, not the best word to describe food but just bear with me. It kind of tastes like mole in a sense.
It tastes like mole but with a little bit of sweetness and a bit of chocolatey notes almost at the end. The thing with Korean desserts and many Asian desserts is that it has to be... Not too sweet.
So pat means red bean paste. So this is the red bean paste on top and underneath is shaved ice. So when you're making shaved ice, you get this big block of ice, put it into the machine and it kind of grinds it and creates almost like a snowflake consistency like your boyfriend's...
booty. It's so light and fluffy. You know, your mom tells you to not eat snow that's not white, but here you want to Have some snow that's mixed in with a little bit of brown as well and chunky My first popping food of the year Mmm, Korea doesn't have chocolate.
So we use beans in our dessert I mean if you think about it chocolate is also a type of bean so it kind of makes sense And on top is, as Koreans we love texture So there's something chunky with the beans or something fluffy with the shaved ice and something chewy with the rice cake And this is like the summertime dessert that you need to try and And the vibe is super cozy You know, the whole experience with Seoul is that it's a very walkable city. Yes, it's large, but you can walk everywhere. And public transport and walking is so easy. The sidewalks are big. And it's perfect because there's a lot of food and you gotta walk it off.
In and out. In and out. And we're here in front of Cheonggyecheon, which is a little stream that runs across North of the river and it's a place where people come and drink their coffee After lunch to relax put their feet in the water and don't worry the water is very clear clean because it's like filtered water but yeah it's a really cool place to chill and skedaddle for free doobies i do it for free Ahhhh! I can't, I can't, I can't, I can't, I can't, I can't. It's so cold.
Nothing like refreshing. If you look around this, it's covered by buildings. And Cheonggyecheon is really that safe haven that all the corporate workers come down to during lunchtime and just enjoy a nice walk, get your steps in.
It's really a place of refuge in the big city. Okay, but right now it's too cold. The kids screamed when he got close to me. He was like, Ah! Also another perk about walking along Cheonggyecheon is that you're gonna see these really cute small like roadside delis just like the one over there.
And they're small independent owned and it's a great place. It's a little different from regular toast. It's not just toast that where you pop it in and it pops out with a little bit of butter.
Korean toast is egg. So she's putting the egg patties and inside the patties is cabbage. You can't forget about the... and ham either.
Oh, also the American cheese. Thank you. So this is a classic Korean toast.
It's toast, buttered, and then pan-fried with a little bit of a cabbage egg mixture patty, more cabbage on top, ketchup, and our secret ingredient, a little bit of sugar. Because I can always be a little bit sweet. Let me take a bite. Mmm a little bit of that saltiness from the ham and the cheese it makes it a perfect bite Definitely one of my favorite Korean fast food.
I love it so much and it's something that you should also try Yes, all the ingredients are something that you can get abroad, but this classic combo is something you can only get here. What's your name? Som. Som. Som.
Hello. Som and Somen? Every Asian family has a white dog. That is a fact. Hello!
Did you really come and eat in Seoul if you didn't come and eat at Gwangjang Market? There's really nothing like it. Yes, there's gonna be a lot of tourists. Yes, it's gonna be crowded And yes, you might get shmied because prices have been inflating But hey, if you know the right places, you're not gonna get shmied and today I'm gonna be your anti-shmeizer So you go to the right places. So trust me and follow me The thing with Gwangjang market is not only do you eat with your Mouth, but you also eat with your eyes.
Damn, I'm a poet. I'm a rapper now. But I left out of the blue, now I got nothing to lose I hate that I still hear your voice All through the night you're still calling my name I hate that I do anything So we got our hot dogs. One of the most important aspects of Korean hot dogs is the sauce. And the array that we have here is sweet chili.
We have good old ketchup, honey mustard, mayo. We also have some spicy mayo from the Samyang brand, which is the buldak noodle mayo. As well as garlic soy mayo.
I think I'm just going to do the classic combo of ketchup and mustard for the potato hot dog. Ah! Not bad.
And mustard. Nice. And for the other one, I think I'm gonna do garlic soy mayo for the whole fried mozzarella.
Because cheese and mayo, honestly, I'm ready to die early. I'm ready. Let's start with the whole mozzarella cheese hot dog.
You can already see the cheese kind of like oozing out from the side, and it's just bursting. That was intense. Bursting!
Okay, this is gonna be hot. Are we ready for this? Are we ready for the cheese pull? Are we ready?
It's beautiful. Oh my god, the garlic sauce is actually so garlicky. I freaking love it.
It-let me just get rid of this first. You know that meme of the puffer face like vomiting out the carrot that it was force-fed? I feel like it's that but instead of a puffer fish as a Korean hot dog and instead of a carrot as cheese So it's better and the sauce choice with the soy garlic mayo bomb. It reminds me of Domino's garlic knots and for America Americans that know what that tastes like, I know you guys are salivating.
Cheese is stretchier than a yoga instructor from Greenwich, Connecticut. Wow, mmm, delicious. Now it's time for the potato hot dog.
So these little embedded chunks, these are potatoes. I feel like this is the quintessential Korean hot dog. It's where it was born, I wanna say.
What is characteristic of American hot dog is just the hot dog with the penne, but then Koreans were like, you know what, why not make it even more carby? because carb fuels life and happiness. So this is the potato hot dog, and drizzled on top is ketchup and sweet honey mustard.
Super crunchy. The dog in the hot dog is really good. And the potatoes add like a nice, like soft, pillowy bed. And like when you bite into it, you get that crunchy frosted flakes, you get that meaty, juicy hot dog, and that really soft, pillowy potato chunks, like little hash browns. Honestly, this is breakfast.
for one. This is a whole ass meal. You get your carbs and your protein and a little bit of fat. I don't know about you but to me this is a well-balanced meal. Me as a food science major is just saying just bullsh**.
What's really interesting about Korean hot dogs is that they dip the hot dog in a wet batter and then really press down on the frosted flakes so that it really adheres and then you fry it for five to six minutes just until the either the cheese gets really nice and melty and the outside crust gets super crunchy and golden brown and pretty. Just like you baby girl. But yeah, great start to our Gwangjang Market street food.
I have a couple more places. The next place is gonna be what I like to call the queen of Korean street food. Something spicy, something chewy.
Going to be tteokbokki, bitches. The tteokbokki here is that it's a radish tteokbokki. I know it sounds rad-ish. And the radish, it gives a nice sweetness and earthiness to the base of the tteokbokki.
So they don't add any water and all the moisture that's coming out from the radish, that's all the sauce and the juice. So it's really sweet and that natural sweetness really shines through. I'm literally salivating as I'm talking right now, but let's get in line and get some.
It's like too difficult for me right now. Tteokbokki and fried chicken set. Rattle and cutting it into little flongs And on top of it is an avalanche of briefly marinated radish just piled on top.
And on the side we have some fried squid that's been fried in wet batter. And you see these little specks? These are just like parsley.
Just to make it look a little bit more appetizing. And it smells amazing. They're just frying mounds of long schlong.
I don't know why I have something with schlong and schmies today. I don't know, okay? We're just gonna roll with it, okay? Give me two little schticks.
Schticks also! Are you kidding me? Yeah, SCH as chopsticks and look at that.
Oh my god, the sauce is so good. Everyone's just laughing at me. She's finding me so entertaining over there. She's just laughing at me just like licking the rim.
This is maybe what they call a rim job, huh? No laughs? No laughs? Huh? Okay, I'm gonna try the squid first.
Kueh tastes like butter. Super soft, super tender, not tough at all. Even with that sauce just drizzled everywhere on top, it still holds up that crunchiness. I'm gonna get some of the radish. It's almost like noodles at this point.
Crunchy. but in a different way that comes from vegetables. And when you bite into it, all that like sweet radish juice just explodes in your mouth, kind of mellowing out the spice.
And you don't get that like synthetic sweetness that you would get from many ddeokbokki street stalls. You don't know where you're going. I'm gonna try the rice cake now.
Beautiful. Almost looks like a mini radish also, but it's not. Super chewy, soft, and pillowy.
It tastes like mozzarella. Like I've been dreaming about ddeokbokki, and this is one of my favorite places to come. This. This style of tteokbokki is also similar to a tteokbokki place that I go to in Busan, which has a lot of radish. It's the natural sweetness and the sauciness that really sets this tteokbokki apart from all the other stalls.
And if you think about it, this place, they're not selling like 20 different things. They're only selling really one main thing and specializing in it. And you want to be going to places that specialize in something and do it well.
So yeah, for tteokbokki, you need to come check this place out. And the fry too. Oh my god. Mmm. Now I'm ready to get more fried food because apparently Korean street food just means me ingesting a lot of fried food.
So let's get some donuts. In this place, they're called Gwangjang Mugwort Sisters and they specialize in selling mugwort hotteok. So mugwort is an herb. I know I said perilla is the herb of Korea and I still stand by that, but mugwort...
is an herb that's used in a lot of desserts. It's earthy, it's a little verdant, it really is the Korean matcha in a sense. The whole process is magical.
She has this big vat of mugwort dough and it's so stretchy. the gluten formation of that yeasted dough is there. You get that really nice chewy texture from a dough that's very glutinous.
And then she fills it in with a sugar cinnamon mix and then seals it, drops it into a pool of hot simmering oil. And as the dough touches the oil, it puffs up. She flips it and then crushes it down like your hopes and dreams. And when she presses down the hotteok, the edges kind of inflate, creating almost like a UFO type of shape and she keeps flipping and basting and flipping and basting until we are met with this beautiful hotteok. And hotteok is almost always served folded inside a cup because it's very hot.
Thank you. This is what it looks like. Gorgeous. Oh, it's so hot. I'm sorry.
Ah! Mmm. Mmm. But that combination of the sweet syrup with the really nice earthy mugwort kind of hitting you and that nice... almost mochi-like gluttonous texture as you're chewing through.
The combination is amazing. As I said, there's so much to eat and drink and see inside Gwangjang Market. It's huge. And I don't know if you realize, but there's multiple streets and most of the times people just go to the center and try and find places to eat or just go to the Netflix lady.
I'm sure all those places are great, but it's really also good to know what specifically you want to eat and going to the places that specializes in that. I had a great meal. Feeling very full, very happy. My eye is full and so is my stomach and my mind.
That's the true words of a badass. Okay, on to our next destination. Super hectic, but I feel like this is part of a very Korean experience when in Korea You've got to have some meat to meet people That's a Jin Dang reference from Silicon Valley if you know, you know, but this is a whole galbi alley, kaibi meaning ribs, and it smells of barbecue.
I can barely open my eyes from the smoke just permeating the air, also from a little bit of ciggy action, but let's go in. All the good places are hidden in the alleyways, but don't worry, I got you. Look how freaking packed this is. It's crazy. So all of this, everyone's just having barbecue, having a good time, drinking a little bit of soju.
And the place we're going to is that one. It's an unassuming place on the second floor, but you'll see why. Come follow me. Just right here, up the stairs.
Smells good. Smells like meat. Proper Korean barbecue etiquette 101. You need to have proper attire because this is holy. And you want to have the perfect etiquette and the attire for it.
You want to be looking like this. You want to have an apron. Almost all Korean restaurants will have aprons ready because you don't want that oil splatter or a little bit of kimchi No, no, no, no, not on your tidy whiteys. You want that to be pristine It'll still be smelling like grilled meat, but that's just the price you have to pay.
Okay, shall we go over there? over some of the meats because I'm very very ready. We're starting off with the quintessential cut for Korean barbecue pork belly.
This is our most priced cut and for me I don't know there's always that everlasting contention of is it gonna be pork is gonna be beef but pork it's indulgent it's cheap. Beef that's not an everyday thing. Beef is what you eat when it's a special occasion especially when it's on the corporate company card that's when it's the most delicious. You don't want to be eating You're eating beef on your own dime.
Beef is best enjoyed on somebody else's dime. Do you hear the sizzle? I want you to really take that in. This is peak journalism, by the way.
Let's briefly go over what the side dishes are. So for a good Korean barbecue, the meat, of course, you know, takes the crown for the showstopper, but what's really important are the side dishes called banchan. We went over the concept of banchan earlier before, but it really sets a good Korean barbecue place from a great Korean barbecue place. And you can tell that from the ferments.
This, to me, whenever there's some pa-kimchi, which is scallion kimchi, It's a good sign. It means that they're making this in-house. They care about the side dishes. We obviously have some aged kimchi some onions and a spicy mustard and soy Vinegarette we have some twin time to get with your soybean paste soup. We all also have the steamed egg It's deflated a little bit, but we call this a bomb seeing a because it's bomb diggity calm But also because it looks like a bomb one of the first things that you need to learn as an intern when you're starting in the corporate world is learning how to grill meat.
When you're the youngest in a company, you're going to be in charge of grilling the meat, and if you fuck up, boy, say goodbye to your promotion. Because grilling meat is an ultimate way of showing respect for your elders and a sign of service, because we care about acts of service in this country. Words of affirmation? Nah, my mom has not said I love you in 20 years.
And you see how this grill is shaped kind of like a concave? The fat pools on the sides, right? With that fat, we're gonna add the kimchi. And all that kimchi is going to soak up the lard and become really nice and golden and caramelized and umptuous. It's gonna get a little crispy, it's gonna get a little burnt, but that's where all the flavor is.
I think our meat is ready, but real Korean barbecue is never ready without some... Keep in mind, today's a Monday night and everyone It's out eating barbecue and drinking soju and getting wasted. What's the celebration you might ask? Well, it's a Monday and you gotta get through your work week somehow.
So good. I know it looks intense. Trust me, it smells intense too. I'm gonna make a little ssam.
I have some lettuce and a little perilla leaf. This is the herb of Korea. You can think of it as the basil of Korea. Okay, what I like to do is put a little slice of well roasted pork belly, a dollop of ssamjang, a slice of raw garlic, and if you're hardcore like me... And this is the way.
You use your teeth in order to portion control. A little bit of spicy green chili to add a little bit of green spice. And this?
makes all the shit you went through today wash away. Food and drinking is the number one way that we Koreans get rid of our stress. We don't have drugs. You go to prison if you smoke marijuana.
How else are we supposed to decompress? Good food, alcohol, people getting wasted on a Monday, that's our way of just letting out stress. Some people have therapy. We have soju.
So on to the Creme de la creme, which is going to be the pork skin. So it's perforated, and see how it's kind of puffing? We're gonna flip it.
It takes a while though. Dip it, it almost looks like a donut. It's chewy, a little bit of oil, and with the soybean powder, it's a perfect match. Every Korean meal ends with rice. We always wanna have protein first because we don't want to fill up on rice because if we're eating out and having barbecue with our friends, we want to fill up on meat not rice because we can have rice at any time but still you miss something comforting so you always go back to her.
And next to it we have have very similar to the soybean paste stew that we got, but this is a level above in terms of funkiness and age and umami. I don't know if you've had tempeh before, but you know that like funkiness that comes from tempeh? It's exactly that. This is essentially Korean tempeh soup, and inside is a lot of leek, aged kimchi, tofu, and zucchini.
It almost has like a cheesy odor, like Parmesan, and we like it. It kind of smells like feet, but we all love feet. Wow, that is funky in the best way possible.
You don't want to have cheonggukjang that doesn't smell like anything. That's like having cheese that doesn't smell. There's something funky about it. Not in a good way. It hits you right in the nose.
The same type of stinkiness that might come from a donkotsu ramen or a fine aged wine or cheese. This is up that caliber. You're like a little piggy rolling down the stairs.
That was too much. Honestly, what a fantastic meal. You just have to start with Korean barbecue.
First night in Seoul, there's no other way. It's a rite of passage. You need to put the apron on.
You need to get a little bit of soju. You need to feel a little tipsy and smell like smoke and meat. It's the only way to go.
So you call these roadside eateries, pojangmacha. Essentially, it means package carriage. So it kind of comes in like a little carriage, little kiosk, and people just are setting up shop and drinking, and when the weather's nice, everyone's out. Keep in mind this is a Monday so this is crazy the amount of people that are just drinking and having fun on a Monday night and this is like the true essence of Korean drinking. I've gone out and drank one of these places before especially in my my How to Drink Like a Korean episode.
Today I'm saving a little bit of my liver space because tomorrow we're gonna go out. But if this is kind of your jam, just sitting and drinking with your friends with a little bit of greasy food, this is the place to be. And this is Jongno Samga Ipgu. I'll put all the names of the descriptions of the subways so that it's easy for you to map it out.
That's how my dog greets me in the morning. Good morning, Doobies. We are in my home territory. Am I doxing myself? Maybe, but you know what?
I'll do it just for you. And maybe my lease is ending soon, so who cares? We are in Seongsu.
This is the place that I live. It's right next to Seoul Forest and it is one of the best streets to be if you like Korean cafe culture. It's currently 9.30 in the morning and the street is peaceful. It's residential.
But in a couple of hours, it's going to get really busy. A lot of the coffee shops are not open yet but the really good places, they're open now. I'm going to take you to two places. One of my favorite bakeries here in Seongsu and also a cool coffee place just for you. Holy hipster gib shit.
So, Sangsu is located on the eastern side of Seoul. You can think of it almost as a Brooklyn of Korea because it's like kind of hipster, there's a lot of cafes. And what's best about Sangsu, it's that there's a little bit of that old city vibe with the Seoul forest and it's the place to be right now and it's probably the hippest neighborhood in Korea right now. We are here in front of Seongsu Baking Studio. This is my favorite place in the neighborhood.
They make fresh bread, really good sourdough. This is like my true hidden gem of Seongsu. I don't feel so good about sharing it to the world, but at the same time, I'm really happy for this bakery. And I want to see them do well, like a small business operated by women.
I'm sharing this one with you. Sourdough, I'm going to pick one up. It's one of the... best sourdough here in Korea and there's not that many places that does a good sourdough. The cheese olive ciabatta, if you come in the morning it's gonna be warm.
It's pillowy, it's made with potatoes, so it has that like really nice soft pillowy-ness. And then we're also going to try, you know what? An ang butter.
And you'll be surprised to see what that yellow thing inside is going to be. And I think that's pretty much it as to what we're gonna get. Oh, actually, and their pretzels are to die for.
And their paninis are also really good. You can tell that I'm a big fan. I Really two schools of thought when it comes to coffee. There's the light roast and the dark roast. I like both and I will show you two places for each of the roasts that I like in this area but a light roast is something that's lighter in color it's more floral It's floral, it's acidic, and you can get some of the more fruity notes of the coffee.
And a place that does it well is Mesh Coffee. They've been open for almost 10 years, and it's been the coffee shop that of this neighborhood formed around it was here before songsu really even became a hot spot and they've been focusing on light roast coffee one of the first people to do it here in korea and for that reason alone this is an important coffee shop that i want to talk about Forest is the biggest part inside Seoul and it's just one of those places where you can see so much greenery and it's connected to the Han River which most people don't know about and you can see all these old people just working out using the public machines and playing pickle ball, kids playing football or soccer, whatever. But yeah, so many people with dogs.
It's a really great place to be. Seoul can get hectic and I know that, but it's a place where you can come and just relax a little bit. This is my spot.
I've been coming here for the last three years. I've cried here even. Isn't it so peaceful?
It almost doesn't feel like Seoul. We have a pond right behind us, and there's cherry blossoms in the back. It's really the most beautiful time of the year to be.
Quoting the famous words of Cardi B, Let's get that bread, get that bread, get that bread. I'm gonna start with my favorite, olive cheese ciabatta. This is my favorite thing to get here.
Look how it just rips apart, that dough. You incorporate potato in it, so it really just obtains moisture and fluffiness. And the little bites and the morsels of cheese and the salty olive is sublime. But this is a purely cooked. invention called Ang butter.
So Ang is kind of the Korean word for red bean paste and butter meaning butter. It's just Koreanized. So you see this thick slab of white inside?
That's butter, baby. Koreans, we're very serious about butter. We like taking things to the extreme and we eat butter like cheese. And if you think about it, butter is the best form of cheese.
Why? Because it's the fattiest, it's the worst for you. Well, actually, it's a good source of animal protein, but you know in moderate amounts. But for Ang-butter, you don't want to be moderate. You want to be extreme.
Will you marry me? You can know how good a bread is just from the sound of it. If you're wondering what this tastes like, the cold butter and the sweet red bean paste, the combination is phenomenal.
You get that salty butteriness as well as the sweet, soft, creamy red bean paste with the crispy baguette. So good. You need to try it when you're in Korea. So cherry blossom season is around the first or second week of April and the reason why Koreans go feral over cherry blossom season is because it's so ephemeral. It's only a week, you know, it falls off immediately.
It's delicate and because maybe it's so rare, we cherish it that much more. Get it? Cherish blossom? For lunch, we're gonna grab some Korean Chinese food.
It's something that you can only get really in Korea, and it's the first Korean fast food. And this place is a local establishment. It's called Beijing Restaurant, located in Shinsa.
They reserved a room for us, just for you and I. And three more people. Hello!
You look so 90s. Okay, so I'm thinking. we go with the classics. We do a jajangmyeon, we do a jjamppong, we do a gukmandu, we do a bokkeumbap.
Tangsuyuk. Tangsuyuk. Suck, suck.
Show it over. A very important Korean film that everyone needs to watch is Oldboy. And in Oldboy, the guy eats fried dumplings for almost 20 years. So he tries to find out where he gets locked up.
And this is very historically and culturally significant. Did you watch Oldboy? Yeah, I watched it.
Of course. If there's one movie you need to watch from Korea, Oldboy walked so that Parasite could run. And fried dumpling is the first thing.
that you can kind of tell the quality of a restaurant and you can see how crispy the wrapper is. You get almost these like blister marks like you have scurvy. And look at the pleats too. There's also a Korean saying that if you can make beautiful dumplings, you'll make beautiful children. Okay, I'm gonna break this apart and look how juicy that is.
Inside is pork, glass noodle, chive, and garlic. And the quintessential trio of side dishes for every Chinese restaurant is chunjang, which is fermented black bean paste. A little bit of soy sauce with vinegar. Raw onion because it's 2024. You gotta get used to it.
An onion is a spicy apple. And some pickled radish that's dyed with yellow coloring. This is like the classic trio. And then on the side, you have some gochugaru.
That's fine. So it's fine chili flakes and also vinegar. And...
Everyone has their own special dipping sauce. My family, we like to do half and half vinegar to soy and a lot of chili pepper. Ready? Yes.
So when the hot stew meets the crispy rice, because the rice has a lot of oil still intact, when the oil hits the sauce, it emulsifies and creates this beautiful crispy scorched rice with the sauce. is made up of seafood and the base is chicken stock to really give it that really nice umami boost and you get that nice sound effect and you know it's also fun like when you order this for the table you get the sound effect and also like the visual you know it's equivalent to a hibachi grill so inside Hamon de Ringstang you're gonna find baby octopus, squid, napa cabbage, shrimp Sea cucumber is a very very important component to good haemul nurungjitang because it gives it that like depth of flavor which is why it's kind of like fancy Chinese food and it's really the amalgamation of land and sea and you get all those flavors combined in one and the combination of the two just becomes way too OP. Trust me it's really really good.
Mmm, the crispy rice, it like soaks up all the juices so it becomes really nice and soft. It almost has like a congee consistency with a little bit of indulgent-ness because you know, it's fried so you get that extra added fat in and it's just So so good. It almost tastes healthy, but I don't know if it is.
Probably not. Gancho-saewoo. So it's chili shrimp.
And next to it, we have some Korean-style tangsuyuk. So tang means sweet and su means sour. So it's sweet and sour pork.
This is the food that we order as like a Chinese takeout and like as a fast food. And there's two schools. There's the kind that likes to dip the tangsuyuk or like it already pre-sauced.
But this place, they choose it for you. It's already going to be pre-sauced. And there's a reason for that, because they're confident that their batter is crispy enough that it's gonna hold up to the sauce.
And here we have our fried rice. Very popular, always served with a side of house-made jjajang sauce. And jjajang is black bean noodle sauce. And we're gonna get, you know, the two very basic items to get at Chinese restaurants, which is jjajangmyeon and jjambbong, in a second. But this is what the sauce is.
If you're feeling like rice and not really feeling like eating noodles, this is what I would usually... get so jajangmyeon is the noodles and jajangbap is the rice. jjajangbap is the same rice okay okay a little a little description of who this is we've been friends for how long like five years now?
I mean since you came back to Korea yeah like four or five and so Miguel-Ish where are you from? I'm from Mexico. Why do you live in Korea?
So I was in the US my thing has always been like learning languages and adventures I've lived in Europe some parts of Asia Asia. You're a true globetrotter, huh? I try. I feel like tough life chose me.
Show me your hands. The most beautiful hands I've ever seen has not touched a drop of water. For the food at Korean Chinese restaurants, it is always and will forever be jajangmyeon.
And the arch nemesis to jjajangmyeon is jjamppong, which is a mixed seafood stew. It's always the everlasting question of should I get jjajangmyeon or jjamppong today? Jjajangmyeon or jjamppong?
It's quite easy. If you want to eat something spicy or not spicy, not spicy. Wow.
Oh, so there it is. If you're feeling a little spicy, a little Miguel-Ish-ish, then you go for the jjampong. If you want something more sweet and comforting and umami-driven, you go for the jjajangmyeon. My favorite is always jjajangmyeon. My dad's is always jjampong.
So it really depends on the person, apples or oranges. And the noodles here are perfect consistency. You don't want it to be too thick, because it's not udon, but you don't want it to be too thin, because it's not lo mein.
It should be the perfect consistency where it's thin enough to be mixed and not... clump but thick enough where you get that really nice satisfying mouth feel and the sound quoting tiktokers is this is what good jajangmyeon sounds like Mmm, it's comforting, it's salty, it's sweet, you get the onions and the smokiness. Also, one of the best Chinese Korean places here in Seoul.
And this place has so much history, like it's family operated, it's small, it's been in the same location for almost 50 years. It's amazing. After a 10-minute ride, we're here in Gangnam where there are skyscrapers.
A lot of people open Gangnam style. That Gangnam is here. So Gangnam is essentially just... south of the river. This is the new part of Seoul.
It's also kind of the connotation of new rich so it's flamboyant, it's flashy, it really has all the characteristics of a big metropole. I mean Gangnam is kind of the place that people come to to party also like it's usually the first place that most people come and like go to clubs and stuff it's not my vibe but if you're into that like this is the place to be this is also where like you know young people go to booking which is like you get set up at these like restaurants that like pair you up like men and women it's a bit of like a mix of corporate and freakish especially at night but we're here during the day and what Gangnam is perfect for is shopping You can find so many cosmetic stores. There's really everything and if you're really into skincare Just walking along the street.
You're gonna find every skincare store So Olive You is basically the Sephora of Korea You can find everything related to Korean skincare and this place spans over three floors The first floor is makeup, beauty tools, second floor is skincare, and then the third is for hair So it's all about self-care and the thing in Korea is that we love skincare That's why That's why we have something called 21-step Korean skincare routine. And Olive You is the place to shop if you want to just buy a little bit of souvenirs and try out a bunch of different things. So we've made it to the west of Seoul.
We're here at Hongik University right by a college that's very famous for arts and performance. It's the hub of culture and it means that it's a college town. It's vibrant, there's good food, there's cheap eats, and there's always... something happening and music flowing in the street.
We're gonna start off our first meal with something that you can only get here in Korea which is raw marinated crabs. Sounds a little freaky? Maybe it is but it's really really gonna be good and trust me you're not gonna regret it. regret it.
When you come to Korean restaurants, you're going to see a lot of these pop up. Is this a Chili's kind of system? Yes. Why?
Because we like efficiency and also it's really hard to find staff to work at restaurants. So this has been the answer to our problems with the low fertility rate and a lot of people going to colleges and not wanting to work physical labor jobs. This is our solution to...
waitresses and waiters. And also if you think about it, we don't have a tip culture, so there's not that much of an incentive for people to work in restaurants. It's hard, it's laborious, so this is the solution that a lot of Koreans come up with.
So we're gonna order two of the set menu, and because it's three people, we're also going to order one of the crab just on its own, and that should be good enough. Voila! And the bell rings in the kitchen.
because this is quite buttery and soft and we just kind of want something a little spicy to offset it. It smells delicious, I cannot wait. This is the head of the crab and it's just been kind of dissected and you can see all the orange. This orange means that it is a female crab that has been really, really just getting all its eggs. It's that egg and that roe.
And this is the creme de la creme because it's where all that fat is and where all the flavor is. You get two gloves. You grab one of these soy marinade. Crab's just bursting with roe.
I'm gonna squeeze it just for you. Look at how juicy that is. Filled to the brim. She was one pregnant crab once. All them babies.
Abortion. Fetus has been deletious. That is delicious.
Or fetus delicious. That kind of rhymes, right? Soft, it's buttery, it like melts in your mouth.
By marinating the crab in soy sauce, it just absorbs all that juice. I'm gonna squeeze it out and pour it on to the rice. So this is all the inners and the brain and this is where the good part is. You want to make sure you get really all the nooks and crannies because that's where all the good stuff is hidden. A little bit of that crab roe.
and the masago with the salty seaweed and fresh made white rice and a nice nutty aroma of sesame oil Wow, so good. And to even make that even better, and because you know, I cook, I'm a food YouTuber, and I care about presentation. The beauty of it is putting this back into the crab shaw, you know like pineapple fried rice, just put it back in. And there we go, we have presentation and the next Gucci spring and fall collection right here. Something about eating it straight from the shell just makes it even better.
It definitely gets super hectic at night here in Hongdae. It's really the party district because there's so many young people just like eating and drinking and having fun. The club district is a little bit further and if you're into the nightlife, there's really great hip-hop and like...
EDM, like whatever niche you're in, Hongdae is going to have that. It's kind of freakish, but in the best way possible. Also, now that we have a full belly, what better way to get rid of some calories than by some karaoke.
The thing is in Hongdae, trends come and go very very fast and there's always gonna be a new dessert but right now Changhulu literally has Korea on a chokehold everyone is having Changhulu and it's It's just so popular. A couple years ago, it was churros. A couple years before that, it was gongcha, bubble waffle, s'mores.
It's always changing, but right now, we're gonna get some crispy, crunchy, tanghulu. See how it almost shatters? It's like glass.
Mmm. Essentially, it's just really crunchy fruit candy. It's really good.
It makes the taste of the fruit, like, at least, like, 300% better. It's fruit. How bad could it be?
So right now we are in Ihwa Byokhwa Village, which means mural village. So you're gonna see a lot of artwork from local artists painted on the walls. I'm a little hungover this morning.
So this is... a little bit tough especially after a night out in Hongdae. I'm definitely gonna get some hangover soup after this. But you know what? Being hungover is a social construct.
You gotta win it because no pain without gain. No, but what I really love about this place is that it's really peaceful and like you see these like small houses And you see all these like local residents a lot of grannies live here So it's like super cute and look at this you see the whole landscape of Seoul right in front of you It's genuinely one of my favorite places to come and just get some fresh air And I don't know there's something about being high up in the altitude looking down on people I like looking at miniature people. Let's put it that way And this neighborhood is really quaint and it's really cute and it kind of is also So time capsule back to what life would have been like in the 1970s, 80s. It's a good way to get your calves toned too.
But yeah, if you're a photography nerd, you're gonna come here and froth. You can also find a lot of cute little artisanal boutiques and just small arts and crafts in this area too. It's a small artist. village and in my opinion you can find the best landscape view of Seoul here right by the old castle walls so this was the castle wall that capital of Joseon was well protected and it's a remnant of the old past with you know slightly newer old past and beautiful high-rises and the mountains and the scenery all coexisting together next to Yiwa village is Naksan park which is Naksan Park and you can see The pavilion and the park is situated on the top of the mountain. All remnants of historical Joseon still preserved and open to the public, which is pretty rare in Korea.
And the view from up here is just phenomenal. You can get some great photos and just a slice of tranquility. It's Thursday 11 a.m.
and around here there's a lot of office workers so we're in the Dongdaemun district which is kind of the fashion district and also where a lot of like OG wholesalers come to. And for a lot of wholesalers, they work during the night. So their peak time, this is right around the time when they're coming out of work.
And when you're coming out of work from a long night shift, you want something brothy and comforting. And Haejangguk is the answer. to a lot of people and you can also see a lot of people who drank the day before because it was a public holiday. It was Election Day yesterday and the answer to their hangover cure is gonna be some hot broth and some coagulated blood.
So what I ordered here this is called the Haejangguk. Haejangguk means hangover soup. It really means to detoxify all the toxins from yesterday although you know when you see other tables. It is also a soup that calls for more alcohol because it's that comforting.
So before we get into what the individual ingredients of the dishes are, I'm gonna work with the toppings. So we get this trio of holy trinity of Haejangguk toppings, which are leeks that's been sliced thin. We have some spicy green pepper. This is gonna add some verdantness. It's very similar to flavor profiles of jalapeno.
And I also like to add a little bit of dadegi. So it kind of looks like gochujang but it's a little different because it's not fermented. Dadegi just means to be chopped together finely and it's usually a thick paste made of Korean gochugaru which is the chili flakes, a little bit of fish sauce, a little bit of soy sauce and garlic. And you can think of it as a flavoring agent to make anything super spicy. And I like to add just a little bit on the side.
I haven't fully committed to it just yet but I'm gonna try the soup as is first and then mix it in so that you know you get two soups for one and as a Korean we always love a good deal. So the broth of this is going to be beef. So you can see the beef brisket so this is the brisket cut that they've been stewing for a long time and they use beef bone broth.
The soup is served in a hot earthenware pot that's thick. This thick clay pot is very insulating meaning that the soup is gonna stay warm for a long time. layers of the Napa cabbage called ugeoji.
It's the ones where when you're harvesting Napa cabbage, you only want this middle part of it because that's ideal for making kimchi and also salads. But the outer part, it's way too tough and it's too fibrous and it's inedible unless it's been stewed for a long time. So for a lot of haejangguk places, because it's also much more inexpensive, they started utilizing it into broth and it has so much flavor and even more nutritious than Napa cabbage.
itself. Also have the coagulated cow blood. I know it sounds freaky and it looks freaky.
It's a little porous. It's so rich in iron that a lot of pregnant women eat it and also people that are anemic. The texture is something that you have to get used to but once you get used to it, it's so good and this is like the number one way that a lot of Koreans will cure their hangover. I like to just dump my rice in.
The rice always at hangover soup places are a little bit more dry because you want the rice to be dry not wet in order to to really absorb that soup. It's a soup that washes your sins from last night away. It's hot, it burns, it's scalding. It's like repenting almost.
Look at this. Crowned with the kkakdugi on top is the perfect bite. Crunchy, delicious. A little bit of that acidity and sweetness and the crunch coming from the kkakdugi. I also love the contrast of textures and the temperatures.
That's what really makes a haejangguk great. Now I'm gonna try the coagulated blood. That's what it looks like. The texture is quite crumbly, and I know it doesn't look the most appetizing, but you know what I'm gonna say. I'm just gonna say donyuk mayeong.
And this is a great dish that shows how resourceful Korea is. Nothing goes to waste, even the blood. Now I'm gonna... Mix it in with the jjajangmyeon and the soup is gonna turn red. I'm gonna show you a little trick that I love to do personally.
You see how the kkakdugi comes with a ladle and you get this kkakdugi juice? I love to put a little bit of kkakdugi juice in it. little bit of that juicer because the acidity really brightens up the dish and just really brings everything together and colors the soup beautifully too. Perfection.
You know I slightly overheard from one of the other tables they limit one bottle of soju per one table during lunchtime because they know that this also calls for alcohol. Yes it's gonna make you forget about all the toxins which then makes you want to drink more. bad cycle perhaps but you know this is how Korea lives we live off of alcohol there's something about hangover soup that is truly magical just all that hot broth it like brings your body temperature up and get you ready for the day and that's exactly what we're gonna do and we're gonna go explore Itaewon area It's actually perfect that we came today because today is Eid which is the end of Ramadan So everyone is dressed up looking fancy with lots of perfume probably very very ready to eat right now Look at that so nice, and it's actually really nice that itaewon is the only place where you can find a lot of cultures melded together and coexisting. I think the key word for Itaewon is acceptance.
Everyone understands the differences and happily coexist. And it's a little bubble of its own. If you watch my Itaewon video from about a year ago, I kind of briefly mentioned that this area is going to get completely reconstructed and just torn down and it's already happening here. So somebody's apartment, you know, all their belongings got completely trashed and it's gonna get demolished this summer. It's very sad, you know, it's a neighborhood also with so much culture and history and Korea definitely prioritizes plastic fantastic newer.
is better and very unfortunate though. So the thing with Itaewon is that it's very, very steep. It's mountainous, it's areas where, you know, it's not the best places to build houses but is exactly the reason why a lot of the refugees towns started here. But personally I love these small alleyways.
It has so much culture and history and just this smell of human touch. What? Who are you? What do you do? And what are you doing in Korea?
Who I am? I don't know yet. I'm searching for this. My name is You. I'm from Morocco.
And I really love Korea. The vibe here. I love people. People are so cool.
I'm coming for you. from Taekwondo, so you know, like I do Taekwondo. That's the missing link.
There's one word to describe Itaewon. It's a hodgepodge of people, cultures, and history. You know, this initially started out as like a refugee town during the Korean War when people fled up near Namsan because it's higher altitude, so you could see the enemies coming in, and now it's turned into this super multicultural place where there's A lot of expats, foreigners, tourists, but also local people and you are for sure going to be finding a lot of interesting personalities It just attracts a little bit of, I don't know, I mean it in the best way possible, but freaks and I love it And wherever there's a lot of culture means that there's a lot of good food and we're going to be grabbing exactly that for lunch. Something that represents Korean food in the modern world and something that represents Itaewon.
So I thought that the food that best represents Itaewon is Budae Jjigae So Budae means army and Jjigae means stew So army stew became really famous in the US after Anthony Bourdain showed it on CNN to Anderson Cooper The history of buritjigae dates all the way back to the Korean War. When food was not so readily available in Korea, a lot of the canned meats coming from the US bases were like, okay, this is great, but let's make this a little more palatable for us and something that's gonna feed more people. And the food that feeds a lot of people is always going to be stew. So inside there is a bed of kimchi on the bottom, a spicy sauce goes in, spam, corned beef, hot dogs, sausages, tofu, scallion, sweet potato noodles, and rice cakes, onions all go in and topped off with baked beans.
The baked beans is usually a secret ingredient to create a broth that's really nice and homogenous. And and also a little bit of that sweetness to bind everything together. It's made with completely American ingredients, but the result is going to be something very very Korean. Dang, it looks good. So you can see all the corned beef that she portioned out.
And I like how when she was plating the budae jjigae, it was kind of like symmetrical, kind of like very Wes Anderson of her. Wow, it's meaty, it's smoky, and the taste of processed meat in a stew is so good. I'm gonna have it with the spam and the corned beef. What I like to do is spoon it on top of the rice.
Make sure that rice absorbs all that sauce, then spoon it up like this. This way it's not too soggy and it's not too dry. Spam makes me emotional.
It's the taste of childhood and for many Koreans, we grew up eating a lot of spam kimchi jjigae. And spam is like not seen as cheap food or cheap food. It's actually almost seen as a luxury food to a point where during holidays, we gift spam gift boxes.
It's a very cultural. thing in Korea. It was hard to get and expensive and it was American-made so it was fancy back in the days and that concept still to this day lives on.
Spam is a delicacy and a treat. Maybe it's not good for your health but once in a while it's good for your mental health. Spam for mental health. Don't quote me.
What I especially love about budae jjigae is that it really shows the resilience of Korean people. Yes, Korean War was a horrible horrible past and it's a scar that a lot of people bear and you know You know, my grandma, for example, she still remembers what life was like during the 1950s, during the war. It came out from a necessity during hard times. That's what I love about food, and it's an edible remnant of history.
And for 부레찌개, you always want to end with 라면. So this is 라면 without the soup packet. And essentially, it's the dessert.
You want to put it in the center. And with the leftover little kernels, you want to put it in your mouth. We call this ramyeon ddang, the leftovers.
I used to snack on these when I was studying and you know, there's nothing in the house, nothing to snack on. We always have ramen in the house and we would eat raw ramen noodles. And the best way to bring everything together is to put the noodles in the bowl.
is none other than good old American plastic cheese. If you think about it, American cheese is just cheddar cheese with gelatin. And gelatin is the reason why the cheese melts so evenly. And gelatin is made- made from cow bones.
So when it melts, it almost has like a nice bone broth consistency, making the soup even richer. This is the Korean cheeseburger. Cheesy ramen and budae broth.
Bruh. I'm also very sorry to the future me who's going to be editing this. It's like a spicy mac and cheese, and I love it.
A little bit of sausage to top it off. You don't know how good this is until you try it. It's not a proper Korea trip if you don't have proper Korean fried chicken.
And there's so many different Korean fried chicken places and you really, you can walk into anywhere and I guarantee you it's gonna be better and probably the best fried chicken that you'll ever have in your life. life but this joint is an old mom-and-pop joint that's been open for the last 30 years. It's a local establishment. They're definitely a little mean to you but it's part of the charm.
And look at the exterior. You can just see that there's experience oozing. out of it and the smell of old Greece in a good way. As you can see it's not a fancy fried chicken joint there's a old style like trot which is like Korean old people music playing in the corner.
The more signatures you have on the wall the better the restaurant in Korean standards and this place is an establishment over the years. Okay we have a special guest today Miss You I. Please call me Em. I. My last name is I.
I am. Seongsu. Y-O-U-N-S-U-K. That's my private information. Okay, so here we have some old-school style fried chicken.
And this is kind of the fried chicken that you grew up eating? This is very special food. Yeah? Why?
Because at that time it's expensive. So when my dad was really happy, and he gets lots of money from work, and he... brought this fried chicken at home. Yeah, and my mom is the eldest of three, so I can also always have this drumstick.
Yeah, so this is the most prized piece of fried chicken for a lot of Koreans, and my mom always got the drumstick, and my aunt, who's the second child, never got the drumstick because my uncle, who's the third, was the male in the family, so it was my mom and my uncle. because chicken has just two legs. Unfortunately, it's not a four-legged animal. What's special about Korean fried chicken versus any other fried chicken is that it is fried twice.
If you look closely at the owner frying the chicken, there's two cauldrons of oil. One slightly lower in temperature and another higher in temperature. That's because one, the first frying process is to cook the meat. And then the second is fried at a higher temperature to really make that batter crispy. And you can also see...
that they use a wet batter here and it's golden brown a lot of it usually comes from turmeric and a little bit of egg and rice flour flour and corn starch so it's that golden ratio that makes the perfect crunchy fried chicken shall we you can have it one leg I'll have the other okay cheers Wow Wow, so crispy and so juicy. And the thing with Korean fried chicken is that you want a batter so thin that it's barely coated to the chicken. That's the difference between Korean fried chicken versus American fried chicken.
American fried chicken is a little bit thicker. lot of batter, it's heavy, it's very crunchy, but Korean fried chicken it's light and crispy at the same time. And the secret to that is usually rice flour. Rice flour doesn't contain gluten so it doesn't get doughy and that's the secret to making sure that your batter is light and crispy and just shatteringly crunchy.
And you always need to have draft beer by the side when you have Korean fried chicken. And a very important side dish for fried chicken is moo. So this is pickled radish and it's just pickled in vinegar, sugar, and a fast pickle.
Super crunchy, something acidic to offset some greasiness because Korean food is all about balance even when we're having fried chicken. That batter is to die for. Look how beautiful this is.
It really looks like a wave of... tsunami, but just in oil ripples and dough. Gorgeous.
And next to the side, this very spicy looking noodle dish is called golbaengi somyeon. So a lot of OG Korean fried chicken places always have golbaengi somyeon on the side. So golbaengi is actually...
River snails. Right? You're good at river, right? I don't know. So it's sea conch and it's dressed in a spicy gochujang, vinegar, sugar, and sesame oil dressing.
And right next to it are wheat noodles. And what you do is just mix it around. And it's spicy, it's acidic. The secret is always in the sauce.
And it really depends on which joint you go to. Sometimes I feel like Golbingi Som shows the technical skills of the cook, whoever's making it. And this lady, she's been in business for a long time. So you know that her... Hand taste yes like her instincts her cooking instincts are good.
This is my mom's favorite food Perfect compliment with the fried chicken Now that our bellies are full with fried chicken, we're gonna go enrich our eyes, make our eyes full. And the best way to do that, especially in this weather, is to go to Han River. For every Korean, we always like to end the meal with something brothy, something warm. And I'll show you where that's going to be. What is this?
Taeho, Taeho! Disassemble. You broke it. No, I didn't.
Disassemble. Yeah, if you come to convenience stores near the Han River, you're gonna see a bunch... of instant ramen packets.
I am gonna go for a sesame one. This is one of my favorites, because it's eggy. We're just grabbing some beer and some snacks and a couple instant packets. And it's a little special how they do it around the Hangang location, and I'll show you how.
They have specialized machines here in Korea for ramen. You just... Crack it open, put it into these paper-like looking packets.
And you want to add everything in. And for the cham-gae ramen, which is the sesame ramen, it comes with the... Nice eggy block which kind of makes the broth really nice and creamy. So it's one of my favorites We have this spicy infused sesame oil here But this is gonna be for later at the very end because we don't want to kill the aroma of the sesame And then this one, Anseong Changmyun also a very old-school brand.
Easy peasy. Just a soup packet, goes in. Come with me my friends, I'm gonna show you a whole new world. These machines, you just put them in and then you press the button.
So you scan the barcode, registers what type of ramen it is, and every ramen has the designated amount of water. So it kind of knows all the recipes. So this is an automatic ramen cooker, and it's really only available near the water. And... There's something about cooking ramen from the packets, not the cup noodles, that makes it even better.
And this is an induction stove top. Somehow these containers, they're able to conduct heat and it cooks like this. I'm just gonna loosen up the noodles. Just make sure everything's really getting nice and cooked. It's different, the ones in the packets versus the cup noodles.
Like the cup noodle ones are thinner, but these are thicker and better. like many things in life. And mind you, this is like a Wednesday night and it is packed.
There's something about just having ramen by the water that makes it even more delicious. Especially on a day that's like not super warm just yet. Who invented these needs a Nobel Prize.
Okay, let's go back to our picnic table. These are smelling so good. Bye bye!
Did you put eggs in it? Yes beat yeah and like with the water in the background also the breeze still a little cold in April it's gonna be perfect are we ready for this cheers Wow The noodles are cooked to perfection, you know, it's just man will never be able to defeat robot That's just the fact it's been proven even just by a ramen machine It just knows exactly how long to cook it how to cook it the exact milliliter. We need to succumb to AI The thing with ramen, that's really the best time to have it when it's the worst for you. After dinner, when it's too late and you know all the studies tell you you shouldn't be eating this late at night, that's the best time to eat it. Scientifically, not proven.
but emotionally good for you. It's therapy. Ramen is therapy. That's true.
Ramen is better health. This video is not sponsored by Better Health. No offense. A little beer.
Here you go. This is a... Korean wheat beer. They are, it's actually a company that specializes in making flour. Yeah and then they recently came out with a beer and their beer is good and I like their logo it's a little cute polar bear.
Cheers. It looks like Julie. Our dog.
Cheers. Wow so fruity. I can feel the lemon or fruit. Yeah it's so fruity it's like light it's a great pale ale perfect to go.
with any type of snacks. And we have some corn chips, some kkokkal-kon, which is Korean bugles, as well as some hong-ran-bor, which are like small chocolate-filled shoe balls. It sounds weird, but trust me, it's really good.
And these are actually even better when they're frozen, but it's gonna be good. Yeah? Here, do it.
What you do? Okay. Oh, no, no, no.
Oh, that's the boring way, but yeah. That's what you do. Yeah, someone too small. You don't have to do this to me. But that is it to...
our 72 hours in Seoul. Honestly, this experience, it's made me fall in love with my city once more again. Seoul is just one of those...
Seoul is just one of those places where each district has a strong personality of its own. It feels like multiple cities all merge into one. It's one of the most unique metropoles you'll ever ever find in the world. And it's fun. It's really endless and there's so much variation to each district.
And the more you learn, the more you fall in love deeper with Seoul. That's pretty much it. I hope you enjoyed this. Thank you!
Yeah, come to Seoul. It's great. It's fun.
And I hope my love for the city really transferred to you all Thank you so much for watching and as always I love you doobies