Seoul food. Japchae.

These korean glass noodles made from sweet potato starch are honestly the bomb.

They take in so much flavour it's a treat for the taste buds every mouth you take.

The key is to make sure these strands are nicely separated from each other.

After boiling them in hot salted water,

drain and toss in sesame oil before setting aside to cool.

1 tbsp cooking oil

2 tbsp soy sauce (or 1 tbsp soy, 1 tbsp fish sauce)

1 tsp sugar (optional)

1 yellow onion, chopped

3 cloves garlic, chopped

1 piece of bacon, chopped

1 piece of fishcake, sliced

1 green capsicum, cut lengthwise into matchsticks

1 carrot, cut lengthwise into matchsticks

Half a packet of korean glass noodles

Heat oil in pan, and pan fry bacon and garlic till fragrant.

Toss in onion and fry till translucent.

Add in carrot sticks and fry for a couple of minutes before adding in capsicum sticks.

Leave in pan to be cooked through till frying slice can be used to cut through the carrot sticks with little effort.

Add soy sauce (and sugar if used)

Lastly, add in fishcake pieces and fry for a couple of minutes.

Throw in the cooked noodles and toss till ingredients have been well mixed into the noodles.

Best served when hot.

**Other ingredients for the japchae would include: black wood fungus, black mushrooms, spinach and sesame seeds.

Seoul food.

Japchae.

Black pork in Jeju

For our last night in Jeju, we decided that we had to get some of that famed black pork.

Apparently there is a heuk-dwaeji street in Jeju which is near to Dongmun market where all the restaurants on that street guarantee that diners would be served black pork from the island's own black pigs. We weren't bothered with finding that street because there's also quite a bunch of these black pork bbq restaurants just right outside our guesthouse at Nohyeongdong which our kind host recommended for us to try.

Over the past two evenings, I've been watching families and groups of friends walking into this establishment and today, it's our turn to venture in! :)

Some of the delicious banchan placed on our table.

Those mushrooms!

My favourite.

And the paper thin slices of pickled radish and seaweed was light and refreshing.

The amount of fat is NOT for the faint hearted.

Every serving comes with mushroom and potato slices and a thick slice of onions to be placed on the grill.

The spicy kongnamul muchim is also placed on the side of the grill and a raw egg is cracked over it.

Yum!

The learner cut is pork shoulder.

Pickled onion rings in soy based sauce for dips and wraps.

*Arhm

And if you hadn't yet noticed.

Those black hairs on the skin is proof that we're having definitely having heuk dweji.

It tasted good, with a smoky aftertaste of bacon.

But if you're asking for my opinion,

this meat costs so much more than normal cuts of pork,

you might just be better off eating leaner and more tender cuts of meat from normal pigs!

Dinner was about 130 sgd for 6 pax with two portions of black pork, one portion of pork shoulder, 5 servings of rice and one beer with unlimited refills of banchan of course! :)

일도부평

72-3 Ildoi-dong (520 Yeonsam-ro) Jeju-si, Jeju-do South Korea‎

+82 64-724-8892