Hot tamales spice up a cool hanok
Tamales on tap By Andrew Salmon
Employers may beg to differ over the benefits of these landmark humanitarian policies. Why pay wages when you can get labor for free? So, when you meet an employer who pays his staff a living wage, even when he doesn’t have to, you know he is either a damned fool or a jolly good egg.
After a couple of minutes in the company of Chef Susumu Yonaguni, it becomes clear that here is a good egg in every sense of the phrase.
Yonaguni runs OKitchen, a restaurant that doubles as a training ground for the adjacent cooking school he runs with his Korean wife.
Now, I know of catering institutes that make their students pay for the privilege of working, on the premise that experience in the field is part of their education.
OKitchen from the street
“Hold it!” you cry. “Am I, a paying customer, a mere guinea pig for these students to practice upon?”
Calm down, gentle reader. Yours truly has eaten here twice in the last month, and it was a tip-top feed both times.
Yonaguni, a Japanese national, has worked in some of the top kitchens in New York for 25 years and London for eight, and closely oversees all operations (though that does not stop him from circulating and having a quick snifter with diners.)
Regular readers of this page may even recall, in January, a review of the same place by my colleague, Ines Cho. She visited OKitchen during the evening and sampled one of their more formal dinners, but the establishment’s lunches are so commendable that I gained special dispensation from the desk editor to run another review. So here it is.
OKitchen is set in a converted hanok, or traditional Korean house, in picturesque Gahoi-dong, east of Gyeongbok and northwest of Insadong.
Inside is a stone floor, a large street-side window, and a bar-style servery. Decor comes courtesy of a growing collection of empty wine bottles, but the main aesthetic features are the pale wood beams.
The lunch menu is a prix fixe affair for 20,000 won, and it changes daily.
We commenced with a dandelion salad and Provencal-style fish soup. The former is a handful of dandelion leaves and chopped mushrooms, with crispy croutons for texture and chopped, smoky bacon for flavor.
Like all the best salads, it was simple but enjoyable.
The fish soup was even better. Dark red, with a toasted baguette slathered in rouille (garlic mayonnaise), it proved to be fresh, pungent and grainily textured.
I visit my parents in Provence most summers, and this would pass muster in most kitchens there.
Chili Con Carne
We order tamale and chili con carne. The former is a mushy brick of corn meal dough, served on husk. The filling is shredded, barbequed pork, and is freshened on top with sprinkled cilantro. The side dish is a fresh, spicy salsa. Excellent ― although the portion size follows petite Mexican standards rather than American.
The chili is as good. A mulch of meat and beans topped with chopped onion and cilantro, it is served with thin corn tortillas (seconds are available when your waitress notices your empty platter).
It comes with a “cock’s comb” piquant tomato salsa as well as sour cream.
Why Mexican lunches?
“When I talk about Mexican food in Korea, people only know tacos and burritos, so I decided to convince them that there’s much more,” said the chef.
Given the number of people munching Mex at lunch, he has been successful. He lamented, however, the habits of local foodies. “They think French, and have to have red wine,” he said. “When I say, ‘Why not try a white or a beer’ they don’t get it.”
Speaking of grog, the wine list is dazzlingly international, but humbly priced: Most bottles are in the 30-40,000 won range. We, however, sink a couple of bottles of Heineken, which is damn close to a perfect match for the grub.
Dessert comes in the form of dainty slices of pie or cake. We get mocha cheesecake and pecan pie. Both prove flawless.
Verdict: If you know of better value, professionally prepared Western grub in Seoul, let me know ― I’ll be there in a shot. But I’m not holding my breath.
OKitchen
English: English (and Japanese) spoken
Tel: 744-6420
Booking: Essential
Address: 79-2 Gahoi Dong, Jongno Gu
Parking: None
Hours: Closed Sundays. Hours 12:00-2:00; 6:00-9:00.
Dress: Come as you are
By Andrew Salmon Staff Writer [andrewcsalmon@yahoo.co.uk]
with the Korea JoongAng Daily
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