Ship-Shop

Shopping in Tokyo and Seoul was so much fun! These were my favorite places:

SSFW Concept Shop, Seoul

0101 or Marui Department Store, Tokyo

Tsumori Chisato Gold, Tokyo

Pecan Pie

The best pecan pie in the world (not that I've had them all unfortunately, but we can pretend) is from the Chosun Westin Hotel in Seoul! It is the best! But I can't figure out what in the recipe allows it to be so. What's the secret? Hmmm! Maybe you can tell from the photos...

When I make pecan pie I always add 1-1.5 tsp more cinnamon than whatever recipe I'm using requires. I think it adds a little something, but who knows?

Gyeongbok Palace

If Missoni designed a palace...

Lost in Translation?

Tell me. Would you buy clothes from Teenie Weenie: All That Bear?

Leeum

Leeum or the Samsung Museum of Art was the best museum I visited this year. Its collection is varied and dynamic and the space is beautiful. If you are ever in Seoul, you must pay a visit to Leeum.

Hi Seoul!

Long ice cream, I love you! Pictured are the masterminds of long ice cream.

This is one tall cone of frozen yogurt for approximately $1.25. Take that $5 Pinkberry and $3.75 Yogurtland!

Lee Jeong Lok

I saw Lee Jeong Lok's series "private sacred place" in the gallery of the 63 Building, which is the second tallest skyscraper in Seoul. The gallery occupies the building's top floors and is surrounded by windows, so it feels like an exhibition space in the sky.

Lee Jeong Lok, private sacred place #1-3, 2008

Pretty pretty. I think I will make a miniature for my room with a branch and LED lights.

National Museum of Contemporary Art

Noryangjin Fish Market

Noryangjin fish market is the best place to find fresh seafood in Seoul. I couldn't recognize half of the creatures they had over there. Every morning at 5 a.m. there is a live auction where the best catch is sold to restaurants etc., but that was far too early. I love my sleep! I went at 10:30 a.m., which is probably the least busy time of day. I didn't want to be jostled right into a pile of raw fish!

Oh, how to choose?

"Fishing is much more than fish. It is the great occasion when we may return to the fine simplicity of our forefathers." - Hoover

Palling around.

Sashimi! It was amazing to see the fishmongers clean, debone, filet, cut, etc. the fish. They've some mad skills.

The sharkmonger.

The fishwife. She sold us abalone, shrimp, octopi and a red sea cucumber. I really wanted to buy some red snapper, but to do that I would have had to purchase the whole live fish.

Sorting!

Aerial view. The market is vast!

After you select your seafood, you take it up to the restaurants on the second level of the warehouse where they clean and prepare it for you...

Then you eat! I loved abalone, which I don't think I've tried before. I also liked the shrimp, which they grilled and seasoned with sesame oil and rock salt. I also tried... live octopus! Well, it wasn't actually alive, but the octopus's tentacles were still wriggling around after they cleaned and cut it up. It was creepy to see them all squirming around the plate. The restaurants used to serve the little octopi whole, but then some people nearly choked to death so they stopped. I was pretty scared to eat the wiggling piece of octopus, but I was told that if you chew really fast you can't tell it's moving. I don't think I've ever chewed faster.

Arrival

I arrived in Seoul and where did I go straight from the airport? Can you guess?

I went to a bakery. What is wrong with me?! In my defense, my mom wanted to go there "to get some bread for breakfast," so I was very much a victim of her gustatory schemes. I've been paranoid about my bread addiction for the past week as I visited my neighborhood boulangerie so many times that on the fifth day my favorite bakery man looked up, saw me and stated, "It's nice to be seeing so much of you lately."

Great, just great. This is coupled with the fact that I tried a bunch of pastries like pain au chocolat aux amandes and caramel éclair because I was leaving Paris for spring break and couldn't bear to deviate from my pâtisserie exploration schedule.


We visited Kim Young Mo bakery and of course the store was packed with samples of everything. Crazed by jet-lag (not really), I darted around packing my cheeks full like a giant squirrel. I loved this doughnut, which was covered in sugar and filled with a cherry-blossom infused red bean paste. It smelled just like the blossoms and tasted great too!

http://www.k-breadshop.com/home_index.php