One thing i love to do, to keep me busy in West Los Angeles during the weekdays, is to cook with a theme. So i guess i'd call it a one-man iron chef competition. Advertising has really defined mediocrity, so i had to find some sort of redemption. My first theme, being Korean week. After work, i headed over to California Market (Ka-Ju Mah-Ket) in k-town and perused the aisles. I'm so accustomed to chinese markets and know exactly where to go -- whether it be a market in Monterey Park or Rosemead. I now know how non-asians feel when they go into an asian market and attempt to shop for kung pao chicken ingredients.
So i'm in California market and go thru the veggies first. I must say that korean food has to be the healthiest. if you've been to a korean restaurant, you'll know that the side dishes (baan-chan) they serve you mainly consist of vegetables. i'm all for that.
I then headed over to the deli section and started talking to a lady that owned an in-store restaurant. her special was korean stews/soups (chi-gae and tang). great stuff. she basically gave me a low-down on all the ingredients i needed to make all th side dishes. i'm thankful for mrs. park, otherwise i would've spent another 2 hours there. probably would've been escorted out by the security for loitering.
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I headed to the noodle section and befriended 2 young korean girls. they found my curiosity for korean food to be quite hilarious. god knows if they gave me the wrong information or were talking bad things about me. i don't care. i got what i wanted.
To top it all off, you can't have a korean meal without korean beer. i suggest Hite. it's probably the freshest beer i've ever had. so crisp and light; great with korean bbq.
So i went home and cooked like a madman. Here's the damage from a week's straight of cooking korean food. i even had a few korean friends come over to test the authenticity of it. and they loved it. maybe they were just being nice.
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