From Gangwon-do we start of with a dish from the mountains and one from the sea.

Makguksu – Chilled buckwheat noodles with a rich beef broth, almost like a consomme. Garnished with radishes, Korean pear, cucumbers, crumbled dried seaweed a hard-boiled egg.

Ojingeo Sundae – Squid stuffed like sausage and steamed. A streetside favorite.

 Loading ...

This is part of ZenKimchi’s March Madness 2010. The poll will end at 12 a.m. Seoul Time March 22nd. The winner will go to the regional quarter finals.

The South kicks off with two dishes with passionate followers.

Jeonju Bibimbap is the height of the mixed rice dish, combining delicate tastes into a complete whole.

Samhap carries a smaller but highly devoted following. This is the famous fermented skate served with steamed pork belly, raw garlic, hot peppers and sweet fresh kimchi.

Bonus video of Andrew Zimmern eating fermented skate

 Loading ...

This is part of ZenKimchi’s March Madness 2010. The poll will end at 12 a.m. Seoul Time March 22nd. The winner will go to the regional quarter finals.

We start our battle in the North with two iconic dishes from Pyongyang and Hamheung. These chilly noodle dishes started as humble winter fare and now bring refreshing relief to summer heat.

From Flickr Bibim Naengmyeon – Chilled buckwheat noodles mixed with pepper paste, cucumbers, radishes and other vegetables

Mul Naengmyeon – Chilled buckwheat noodles floating in a beef broth with cucumbers, hard boiled egg, radishes and other fruit and vegetable garnishes

 Loading ...

This is part of ZenKimchi’s March Madness 2010. The poll will end at 12 a.m. Seoul Time March 22nd. The winner will go to the regional quarter finals.

It’s time for ZenKimchi’s March Madness, sponsored by hi EXPAT!

Korean foods from different regions compete for fame and glory on the international stage. Which cuisine will reign supreme?

Here’s how it works.

It all starts at midnight Seoul Time on March 14th. Every day pairs of foods from the regions of Seoul-Gyeonggi, Northern, Southern and Central will vie for your votes. Each region has sixteen foods. The winners of each region will square off in the semi-finals and finals. By the end of March, we will award a lucky Korean food the title of 2010 World Champion.

Disclaimers and technical stuff

We have tried hard to place foods in the regions where they originated or have a popular version. Some things did need to get fudged and wedged in certain regions to balance it out. The regions themselves are a bit blurry. Northern includes any land from Kaesong north. Seoul-Gyeonggi is the capital plus the surrounding doughnut province, including Incheon. Central includes Gangwon-do to the north and cities such as Andong, Chuncheon and Daegu. Southern is mainly Busan and Jeolla-do. I also don’t always follow the government’s standard for romanization because it doesn’t always make phonetic sense (how does hoe sound like “hway?”).

We also have a few wildcard spots. In the comments, lobby for your favorite Korean dish, and if the demand is strong for a food not already in the brackets or one that lost early but is popular, we’ll place it in the wildcard position. Note that we won’t feature beverages in these playoffs. That may call for another round.

Now, stomachs get ready to RUMBLE!!

The highly knowledgeable and entertaining Jennifer “Fatman Seoul” Flinn will lead a tasting tour of 20 Korean dishes. It’s all in English, and lots of mysteries will be revealed along with what I’m sure will be colorful anecdotes.

Here’s the official rap:

On March 20th, O’ngo Food Communications and Seoul Eats will be organizing a Korean Food Taste Tour. Participants on the tour will first enjoy a specially tailored lunch tasting menu consisting of over 20 different dishes and it will be explained by a Korean cuisine expert, Jennifer Flinn, in English. After lunch we will walk over to the historic Bukcheon district to visit 2 museums: A Korean Folk Art Museum (Gahoe Museum) and the Seoul Museum of Chicken Art. At the Folk Museum, we will enjoy Korean Traditional Tea.

After the museum tour, we will head over to a kitschy Korean Rice Wine Restaurant (Makgeolli) to have an Korean alcohol tasting. We will sample and learn about 9 different Korean makgeollis, wines, and alcohols. At this restaurant we will enjoy our drinks with Korean Seafood Pancake (Haemul Pajeon) and Red Spicy Chicken (Dak Bokkeum).

The tour is designed to give travelers to Korea an insider’s view on the culture and the food.

The tour group will meet at 11am on March 20th outside of Anguk Subway Station Exit 6 (Orange Line Seoul Subway Line 3). The tour will last from 11am and finish at 3pm.

The tour will be lead by Jennifer Flinn who has been in Korea for 9 years. She has studied and written countless articles on the food. She is fluent in English and Korean and she is a member of RAS (The Royal Asiatic Society)

The complete cost of the tour will be 80,000 won ($72.00 Dollars) per person. A booklet explaining the dishes and a map will be provided.

Payment can be sent to O’ngo Food Communication’s Bank Account by Bank Transfer at:
Woori Bank 1005-480-990616    ( 최지아 온고푸드커뮤니케이션 우리은행 1005-480-990616)
or sent to Daniel Gray by Paypal at dnlgray (at) gmail (dot) com.

If you are a tourist and need to pay on the day, arrangements can be made.

There are only 20 spots available and preference will be given to non-Korean citizens. Korean tour operators are not invited to attend.

Pumpkin Jeon and Fresh Cabbage Jeon
Spring Green Salad with Pear
A Variety of Side Dishes (Banchan)

Marks&Spencer and Habitat for Humanity will hold a bazaar February 10th (2-8 p.m.) and 11th (10:30 a.m.-8 p.m.) at Geuckdong Sports Centre in Apgujeong.  All earnings will be donated to Habitat for Humanity in Haiti.

I’ve been playing around with many types of calendars and have found that good ol’ Google Calendars provides the most stable solution.  We now have an events calendar.  Check out the link on the menu up top.  It’s fledgling.  There aren’t many events up yet.  So if you know of any food related events, please contact us.

I’ll also use the calendar to post notable restaurant specials.  But rather than having multi-week specials dominate the calendar, I’m just posting the start and end dates for them.  I’ll be upfront and say that many are promos from hotels and other businesses.  But I’d much rather put them together in the calendar than dilute the quality and integrity of the Food Journal by turning it into a product whore.  That being said, I’ll post promos that I think you will be interested in, but I’m not going to post every single promo as separate posts.

Here are some promos you may be interested in:

Feb. 6 – Rose Fever & Chocolate Delight (Vinestock)

W69,000 gets you two hours of wine and chocolate with Thomas Scheidt, the sommelier that has gotten the Seoul food world buzzing.

Feb 14 – JW Grill’s Valentine’s Day

W99,000.  Valentine set menu includes a bottle of bubbly

Feb. 18-28 Thierry Thiercilin, One Star Michelin Chef  (Park Hyatt Seoul)

Provencal and Mediterranean cuisine by a Michelin starred chef

Feb. 18-March 31st Delightful Flavors of Venice

JW Marriott’s Olivo restaurant will feature a seafood-heavy Venetian menu

Wolfhound’s Fish ‘n’ Chips Tuesday and Super Bowl

Our advertiser the Wolfhound will have a Super Bowl party starting at 7:30 a.m. Monday next week.

And remember the popular Fish ‘n’ Chips special each Tuesday.  Buy one get one free.  Bring a friend or an extra stomach.

PLUR (Peace, Love, Unity & Respect) and Green Drinks Korea are organizing an event in Hongdae to help victims of the Haiti earthquake.  On February 12th there will be live music at three venues, Jane’s Groove, FF and DGBD.  The cover charge is W10,ooo, and all cover charges go to the Save the Children’s fund for Haiti relief.  The three venues have also offered to donate a portion of drinks sold.

This is Seollal weekend, so unless you have family obligations outside of Seoul, you don’t have an excuse.  Sounds like a lot of fun.  More information is at their Facebook group.

You may have heard from Seoul Eats and Wine Korea that Vinestock will have a wine tasting this Wednesday, January 13th.  You know when the biggest food bloggers and biggest wine blogger in Korea are supporting something wholeheartedly that it must be something special–or we got paid off really well, which hasn’t happened yet.

I was able to get a preview this past weekend, and for the price, this is a real treat.  I am very green when it comes to wine.  But there’s something about the wines that Vinestock’s Thomas Scheidt has introduced to me.  Surreal transporting experiences.  It’s not just a matter of “I am getting a hint of raspberry, Nike leather and ras el hanout.” The wines transport you to different locales, and some even make your mind time travel to rustic medieval periods.  I also suggest bringing a recording device or a way to take notes because Thomas will fill you up with information at lightning speed–it may cause a synapse to burst.

You’ll need to call and make a reservation and transfer the money through an ATM (very easy if you’ve never done it before).  Vinestock is in Soraemae-eul.  Go to the intersection of Paris Croissant and KB Bank.  Follow the road north behind KB Bank, and Vinestock is in the next building on the fourth floor.

Here’s the info from Vinestock:

Vinestock will have a tasting of four wines from Luca ABRATE (Piemonte, Italy)

1.    2007 Barbera d’Alba D.O.C. “Castelve”, 100% Barbera

2.    2007 Nebbiolo d’Alba D.O.C. “Brico Rotondo”,100% Nebbiolo

3.    2006 Barbaresco D.O.C.G. “Clarin”, 100% Nebbiolo

4.    2001 Nebbiolo d’Alba D.O.C. “Ceisa”, 100% Nebbiolo

Place : Wine Tasting Room at VineStock, French Village, Banpo-dong, Seoul
Fee : 35,000 won (15 persons first-come first-served)
Food: Fresh French Baguette and mini sandwiches
Account Number : Shinhan Bank 110-274-423290.
Contact: 02-536-6081

* 장소 : 바인스톡 와인테이스팅 룸
* 참가비 : 35,000 원(8명 선착순)
(바인스톡에서 아직 정식 수입하고 있지 않은 4 아이템 루카씨 와인과 신선한 바게트, 미니 샌드위치류 포함입니다.)
* 계좌번호 : 신한은행 110-274-423290, 예금주-바인스톡
(입금시 반드시 이름을 남겨 주시고,행사 당일 및 전날에는 입금 금액이 환불 되지 않습니다.)
* 문의 : 바인스톡 서래마을 매장 02-536-6081