I’m in Seoul right now, staying for a little over a week. It’s my first time in Seoul and my first time in South Korea. I’m taking a mostly ad hoc approach to dining on this trip because I didn’t do much planning prior. There is political turmoil in South Korea and in the capital right now - President Yoon declared and quickly lifted martial law last week, and there was an impeachment vote on him over the weekend that failed. There have been protests near the presidential office that shut down a subway station for a bit on the weekend. From my tourist/visitor’s perspective though things seem to be business as usual for the most part.
Hadongkwan 인사말
I arrived in the early morning on a Saturday after a 12 hour flight from SFO, and took the limo bus from ICN to Myeongdong where I was staying. The limo bus was convenient and pretty inexpensive. After dropping off my bags at my hotel and wandering around aimlessly in Myeongdong for awhile I had an early lunch at the original location of Hadongkwan, a restaurant founded in 1939 and specializing in somtang or oxtail soup. It was a bit cold with temperatures in the 30’s, and some warm soup sounded like just the ticket.
When you enter, you order and pay right away. There were three options pointed out - “original,” “recommended,” and “more meat,” which I think is the recommended with more meat. I neglected to ask what was the difference between recommended and original and just ordered and paid for the recommended. They asked if intestines were ok? Sure!
Soon the bowl of soup arrived. There was Napa cabbage kimchi, a lot of sliced scallions, and soy sauce for dipping.
The kimchi was very good. I put all of the scallions into my bowl, which had some rice already mixed in. There was thinly sliced beef, I think from brisket, and pieces of intestine that were tender and a little chewy also. The clear beef soup was quite nice. I added a little bit of salt and pepper to taste. It was a very nice bowl of soup, and it definitely hit the spot in the cold weather.
Lotte Department Store Food Hall
I still had a few hours after lunch before I could check into my hotel, so I spent some time exploring the massive Lotte department store in Myeongdong for a bit. I was most interested in the food hall in the basement though. It’s really quite impressive. Here’s some pics.
There were so many food options that looked really good. I only had room for a snack though and chose an Americano and an apple bun from Koryodang Bakery, which was quite nice. It had a red topping that looked like an apple, and was filled with cream cheese and a sweet chunky apple filling.