Let's All Eat Korean
Anybody who knows Chicago is aware of the fact that you can't swing a cat without hitting a cheap and delicious ethnic restaurant. When I first moved here I didn't have much money. It was a big treat to go to a Korean restaurant down the street called Poolgogi where the food was... cheap and delicious. At the same time, I think Korean establishments are among the more intimidating of ethnic places around here. On the one hand you have the somewhat shady seeming nightclubs promising karaoke and "dancing" where respectable ladies dare not enter. On the other hand you get places with no English signage promising baffling Korean-only menus.
I visited one of the latter when I was an intern at a refugee mental health program. My friend and colleague from Laos, Somlith, was also a fan of Korean food. One day we went to lunch at one of those intimidating no-English places. The tables had little braziers in the middle with exhaust fans over them to suck out the smoke. Everyone in the place was Korean, with no English in sight or hearing. Like most Lao people, Somlith was friendly and cheerful. When a nervous waitress approached us, he asked her name, which was Kim something, like 50% of the world's Korean population. "Like Kim Il-Sung," Somlith remarked cheerfully. "He was dictator!" The poor girl fled to the kitchen, I'm sure horrified at being mentioned in the same breath as The Great Leader. Fortunately, there was an amused bi-lingual businessman in the place who helped us order up a delicious (and cheap) meal. We cooked the meat at the table on the brazier.
Well, my friend Tom was in town from New Mexico recently, and he was jonesing for some Bulgogi, a grilled, marinated Korean beef dish. (I guess there aren't too many Korean restaurants in NM.) I went on-line to find some place cheap and authentic and came up with a restaurant on Lincoln which shall remain nameless. It turned out to be a converted lunch place with a counter and a few booths. There was no one there but us and the proprietress, a (surprise!) Korean lady wearing glasses with green frames. She had a "bubble" hairdo which you may remember from the 60s, covered with a hair net. She was watching a Korean game show on TV. There was no Bulgogi on the menu, but she assured Tom that she could make it for him, so he ordered it, and I asked for a tofu and vegetable stew. She came back with an amazing array of little dishes filled with relishes and vegetables. My entree was in a stoneware dish, plunked on the table with the contents at a FULL ROLLING BOIL (anyone who has ever made fudge knows what this is). I swear it boiled for a good minute or two, right in front of me. Tom was perplexed by a bowl of rice with a fried egg on top and no beef. Between the boiling food, the no-beef bulgogi, the Korean TV show, and the lady's hairdo, I was about ready to lose it. Poor Tom made the best of his meal, and I enjoyed the stew, once it cooled off enough for me to eat it. But no marinated beef.
Just as an aside, Tom and I went out to breakfast the next day at another restaurant that shall also remain nameless. We both ordered pumpkin-blueberry pancakes and scrambled eggs, and they were terrible! I swear, how can you fuck up pancakes and scrambled eggs? Jeez.
www.trifood.com/bulgogi.html
I visited one of the latter when I was an intern at a refugee mental health program. My friend and colleague from Laos, Somlith, was also a fan of Korean food. One day we went to lunch at one of those intimidating no-English places. The tables had little braziers in the middle with exhaust fans over them to suck out the smoke. Everyone in the place was Korean, with no English in sight or hearing. Like most Lao people, Somlith was friendly and cheerful. When a nervous waitress approached us, he asked her name, which was Kim something, like 50% of the world's Korean population. "Like Kim Il-Sung," Somlith remarked cheerfully. "He was dictator!" The poor girl fled to the kitchen, I'm sure horrified at being mentioned in the same breath as The Great Leader. Fortunately, there was an amused bi-lingual businessman in the place who helped us order up a delicious (and cheap) meal. We cooked the meat at the table on the brazier.
Well, my friend Tom was in town from New Mexico recently, and he was jonesing for some Bulgogi, a grilled, marinated Korean beef dish. (I guess there aren't too many Korean restaurants in NM.) I went on-line to find some place cheap and authentic and came up with a restaurant on Lincoln which shall remain nameless. It turned out to be a converted lunch place with a counter and a few booths. There was no one there but us and the proprietress, a (surprise!) Korean lady wearing glasses with green frames. She had a "bubble" hairdo which you may remember from the 60s, covered with a hair net. She was watching a Korean game show on TV. There was no Bulgogi on the menu, but she assured Tom that she could make it for him, so he ordered it, and I asked for a tofu and vegetable stew. She came back with an amazing array of little dishes filled with relishes and vegetables. My entree was in a stoneware dish, plunked on the table with the contents at a FULL ROLLING BOIL (anyone who has ever made fudge knows what this is). I swear it boiled for a good minute or two, right in front of me. Tom was perplexed by a bowl of rice with a fried egg on top and no beef. Between the boiling food, the no-beef bulgogi, the Korean TV show, and the lady's hairdo, I was about ready to lose it. Poor Tom made the best of his meal, and I enjoyed the stew, once it cooled off enough for me to eat it. But no marinated beef.
Just as an aside, Tom and I went out to breakfast the next day at another restaurant that shall also remain nameless. We both ordered pumpkin-blueberry pancakes and scrambled eggs, and they were terrible! I swear, how can you fuck up pancakes and scrambled eggs? Jeez.
www.trifood.com/bulgogi.html
posted by The Lurker at
11:36 PM
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