Korean Markets

After Vietnam, I headed to South Korea to visit some friends from college who are English teachers. Being back in the Northern Hemisphere was a bit of a shock. The cold kind of smacked me in the face after leaving the warm embrace of Southeast Asia but the food did more than make up for it! It’s obvious the Koreans love their food and so do I J Just walking through their markets and there was fresh food everywhere…to eat now or take away and I did a bit of both. 

Kimchi Bar or that's what I call it. Kimchi is Korea's national dish and served with practically everything. This bar had different types of kimchi ranging from the traditional cabbage to radish and all with different ferment ages. 

Fresh seafood was ubiquitous from snails to scallops to many different freshly caught fish...most still alive!

Huge range of dried fish and shrimp...it's a Korean thing!

Dried stingrays...not sure what they do with them but I never ate them...well I don't think I did J 

And one of my favorites, mandu. Cheap and tasty steamed dumplings to snack on while I make my way through the market 

Never guess what this is? I've never seen it before...it's whale. I'll try anything once?!

What's a seafood market without some live crab?!

One of the many street carts. Take your pick from Korean pancakes, Korean rice cakes in a spicy sauce [that'll warm you up] and hot fish cake soup [and boy is it fishy!!!]

Meet my lovely tour guide, O-gook. He showed me all the ins and outs of Seoul and most of it revolved around food. And yes, I’m eating mandu again…not sorry bout itJ