Korea: Tosokchon Samgyetang
Even though CK is Korean-American, she was pretty much useless when it came to food recs in Seoul. Instead, we turned to Jiejie, who has visited Korea a gazillion times. She often jokes that going to Korea or Japan for her from Taiwan is comparable to us heading up to San Francisco.
Minus the going through immigration part.
Anyway, for breakfast on our first full day in Seoul, Jiejie brought us to Tosokchon Samgyetang:
The interior was set up like an old style Korean house complete with an inner courtyard. I would I'd taken a picture of it, but I was a little intimidated by the number of people dining there at 10:00 am on a typhoon day. The tables were a bit close together and it's always awkward when someone looks up right when you snap a photo of them.
Even more awkward when you then make guilty eye contact with them. Ahem.
For the samgyetang noobs like me, Tosokchon provides photo instructions:
Anal as I am, this is the kind of stuff that I love. I gleefully starting arranging my plates as CK and Jiejie rolled their eyes:
On the left was hot tea and ginseng liquor:
Jiejie recommended putting the liquor into the samgyetang, but that wasn't in the instructions, so I refused.
Instead, I carefully mixed salt and pepper into a dish as instructed and set it alongside the garlic slices and ssamjang:
Each table had large pots filled with two types of kimchi, one cabbage and one radish:
You can grab as much as you want...and Jiejie wanted a lot. She's a big fan of their kimchi apparently.
Because we felt bad just ordering two samgyetangs, we added on a seafood pancake (₩15000 or around $12):
It wasn't bad, but a bit eggier than I typically prefer. It was basically just filler while we waited for the main event to arrive.
For those of you wondering what the hell I've been talking about this entire post, samgyetang is a ginseng chicken soup. Tosokchon offers two kinds. There's the black chick or silky fowl (₩24000 or around $20):
And then the regular chicken (₩18000 or around $15):
Each come stuffed with glutinous rice:
That actually was my favorite part of the samgyetang. That rice with that rich broth? Just lovely.
For an extra ₩6000 (around $5), you get the actual ginseng root:
I wasn't too keen on gnawing on the gingseng, but I finally let Jiejie pour her ginseng liquor into the soup.
...I should have let her do it earlier. The liquor intensified the ginseng flavor of the broth in a really magical way.
I'm sorry, Jiejie. I should never have doubted you.
Tosokchon is probably the most famous place in Seoul for samgyetang and I can totally see why. Chicken soup might sound boring, but let me tell you, it's anything but.
토속촌삼계탕
서울 종로구 자하문로5길 5
+82 2-737-7444
http://tosokchon.com/
Minus the going through immigration part.
Anyway, for breakfast on our first full day in Seoul, Jiejie brought us to Tosokchon Samgyetang:
The interior was set up like an old style Korean house complete with an inner courtyard. I would I'd taken a picture of it, but I was a little intimidated by the number of people dining there at 10:00 am on a typhoon day. The tables were a bit close together and it's always awkward when someone looks up right when you snap a photo of them.
Even more awkward when you then make guilty eye contact with them. Ahem.
For the samgyetang noobs like me, Tosokchon provides photo instructions:
Anal as I am, this is the kind of stuff that I love. I gleefully starting arranging my plates as CK and Jiejie rolled their eyes:
On the left was hot tea and ginseng liquor:
Jiejie recommended putting the liquor into the samgyetang, but that wasn't in the instructions, so I refused.
Instead, I carefully mixed salt and pepper into a dish as instructed and set it alongside the garlic slices and ssamjang:
Each table had large pots filled with two types of kimchi, one cabbage and one radish:
You can grab as much as you want...and Jiejie wanted a lot. She's a big fan of their kimchi apparently.
Because we felt bad just ordering two samgyetangs, we added on a seafood pancake (₩15000 or around $12):
It wasn't bad, but a bit eggier than I typically prefer. It was basically just filler while we waited for the main event to arrive.
For those of you wondering what the hell I've been talking about this entire post, samgyetang is a ginseng chicken soup. Tosokchon offers two kinds. There's the black chick or silky fowl (₩24000 or around $20):
And then the regular chicken (₩18000 or around $15):
Each come stuffed with glutinous rice:
That actually was my favorite part of the samgyetang. That rice with that rich broth? Just lovely.
For an extra ₩6000 (around $5), you get the actual ginseng root:
I wasn't too keen on gnawing on the gingseng, but I finally let Jiejie pour her ginseng liquor into the soup.
...I should have let her do it earlier. The liquor intensified the ginseng flavor of the broth in a really magical way.
I'm sorry, Jiejie. I should never have doubted you.
Tosokchon is probably the most famous place in Seoul for samgyetang and I can totally see why. Chicken soup might sound boring, but let me tell you, it's anything but.
토속촌삼계탕
서울 종로구 자하문로5길 5
+82 2-737-7444
http://tosokchon.com/
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