Tteokbokki Town

"Things You Would Only Find In Korea" Part 1:
I make sure to keep this blog G-rated, so there isn't much I can say about the following picture.  Russ and I saw these lamps while we were out on a date a few nights ago.  Did they really think that was the best place for the on/off switch?  And who would buy that and display it in their house?

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I love Korean food.  It is very different then Chinese food or Japanese Sushi, many of the dishes are spicy and there are a lot of soups/stews.  And it is so cheap!  You can easily eat an entire Korean meal for about $5.50 and be totally stuffed.  My friend who is leaving next summer has decided to take advantage of her last few months here and eat as much Korean food as she can before she has to leave.  Thankfully, she often takes me with her when she ventures out.

Since Russ and I had lived in Korea a few years ago, the food was not all totally new to us when we moved here this time.  One of my favorite foods from our first time living here was a dish called Tteokbokki. (pronounced duk-bol-kee)  It is most often a very cheap, small rice cake in a spicy red sauce sold from a street vendor and often customers will stand at the vendor's counter and eat.   Pre-kids Russ and I could both eat an entire meal of Tteokbokki and a few side dishes for about $5.00 total.  I was very excited to get back to Korea to get some good Tteokbokki again.

My friend found out about my love for Tteokbokki and told me about an area of Seoul called Sindang which was where Tteokbokki was first sold and was supposed to be the premiere place to eat it.  It is a back alley known around Seoul as Tteokbokki Town.  She and I went there for lunch one day and I immediately knew this was a place I had to take the family for dinner. This area is known for it's Tteokbokki restaurants more then just the street vendors.  (another time I will post about the street vendors)

Walking under this sign, which I have no idea what it says, is the beginning of Tteokbokki Town

Right past this sign, on both sides of the street are tons of Tteokbokki restaurants.  My friend had heard this one was particularly good so that is where we decided to eat.

Often the Koreans will eat Tteokbokki late at night after hanging out with their friends at a bar.  This restaurant is open 24 hrs to accommodate the late night visitors.

There are a lot of versions of Tteokbokki.  The street version is pretty much just the rice cakes and the spicy sauce, but in the restaurants they add quite a few other things.  On each of the tables in the restaurant is a gas burner and they bring you a huge pan full of uncooked food and set it on the burner to cook at your table. This is what it looks like when it comes out...

There are 2 different types of noodles in this pan-ramen and a rice noodle.  There are 2 hard boiled eggs, the white round things are the rice cakes (they are very chewy), the squares are something that has a slight fishy taste to it, there are a bunch of onions and vegetables and the long fried things on the right are a fried noodle that get soft as it cooks in the broth.  The red stuff on top is a red pepper spice that when mixed with the broth and cooked gets thick.

After a few minutes of cooking it looks like this...

A pan of goodness.  It is delicious.  Everyone eats out of the same pan.  They give you small plates to put your food on to cool but you all eat from the same pan.  (Sharing a pan is very common with Korean meals.)

This is my small plate of food.  They also give each person at the table a small container of pickled radishes.  (the yellow things)  The radishes help to neutralize the spiciness.  I love the radishes with my spicy food, but I like them even by themselves as well.

About half way through our dinner.

Russ enjoying his Tteokbokki.

Many restaurants in Korea only serve 1 thing.  They have a specialty item and only serve that one item with usually a few different versions of it.  But thankfully this restaurant served a few other side dishes along with Tteokbokki.  This meal is to spicy for the girls to enjoy, so we ordered them some Kimbop (that will be another post). 

This restaurant was very large and was pretty much full most of the time while we were there. 

Not many foreigners in this part of Seoul.

The waiters were all lined up ready to serve.

Our entire meal for the 4 of us (including dessert) was less then $20.00.  After dinner we all got some ice cream (which was served at the restaurant as well) and headed home completely stuffed.  I guess I forgot to take an "on the way home" picture this time.