This summer reaches climax.
Actually, it looks too boring to be called as the ‘climax’.
Showers are expected to bring slightly cooler temperature, but in reality the humidity is high and the discomfort index is just like the one of summer.
I think Samgyetang(Korean chicken soup with ginseng) is the best food to gain energy lost by sweating from the sticky weather. As I know, Samgyetang is originally enjoyed with a whole chicken and ginseng, and it was not easy for us to find the restaurant serving the original type of Samgyetang.
I was on my way to Seoul Station in order to meet my wife and my son wanted to come with me. Therefore, three of us gathered in a few days.
With a view to get some energy as well as the family gathering, I searched the restaurant for eating samgyetang, found the restaurant ‘Dongdaemun Dakhanmari (A Whole Chicken)’, and finally visit there.
You can take the exit 4 of Seoul Station and find the way to Namdaemun.
Go a few steps back from the exit, turn right along Severance Building, and then you can find the sign of ‘Dongdaemun Dakhanmari (A Whole Chicken)’.
Though the restaurant’s name is ‘Dongdaemun Dakhanmari (A Whole Chicken)’, the restaurant is actually located near Seoul Station, not Dongdaemun.
We expected that adults would be happy to get some energy from eating a whole chicken and children would be happy to eat a delicious whole chicken loved by people.
These days, many restaurants try to promote with the name of ‘a cow’ or ‘a pig’, so the name – ‘Dongdaemun Dakhanmari (A Whole Chicken)’– brings the image of increasing stamina to mind.
It was around five thirty that was too early to have dinner.
There were some people sitting at the two tables and really tucking into their chickens.
I was grateful to them for serving wet towels in the bowls by counting the number of persons.
However, I didn’t feel like using the wet towel maybe due to the media influence.
This world is so rough, we are easily influenced by others, and we tend to question the source of those wet towels. ‘Ignorance is bliss.’
First, I ordered a whole chicken. The most distinguished one was the bean sprouts salad among the side dishes.
I had visited other restaurants serving napa cabbage kimchi, radish kimchi, and dry side dishes; I visited the kind of restaurant serving the bean sprouts salad in a long time.
Serving the bean sprouts salad, which can easily go sour in summer, shows that the restaurant has a high customer turnover ratio or immediately makes the side dish.
The restaurants serving the storable side dishes may show that they made side dishes beforehand or they do not have a high customer turnover ratio.
Bean sprouts salad can go easily bad after a quarter of a day from when making the salad.
Also, I was so satisfied with serving the chopped leeks and it was refreshing.
I don’t remember when, but the leeks have become one of the ingredients in the restaurants, instead of lettuces and green onions. We made the sauce by using soy sauce, leeks, and crushed garlic for the chicken to dip in.
A boiled chicken in nickel silverware was served. Most Koreans wallow in nostalgia of nickel silverware.
The young Koreans also have memories of nickel silverware; for example, they boiled ramen by using nickel silverware or ate off nickel silverware in the past.
Especially, Korean guys have that kind of strong memories.
In case of the guys who have served in the military, they may have the memory of boiling ramen by using nickel silverware on night duty.
I am not sure whether they did it in the past or not, but the nostalgia of boiling ramen by using nickel silverware always pops up when Korean guys share their memories.
Dipping the chicken into the sauce made with leeks, we chewed up a whole chicken in a second.
Baeksuk(the boiled chicken) was not only tender but also have a chewy texture. Contrast to the outside that was full of the heat and humidity, the inside of the restaurant using the air conditioner did not make me feel hot even though I was eating hot Baeksuk.
Now, it is time to start filling my stomach.
I already had guessed the taste before visiting the restaurant, but at that time I really expected the taste of knife-cut noodles boiled by using the remaining soup after eating only the chicken.
I ordered two extra noodles. Usually, I order three extra noodles in the restaurants. However, at that time, I had to have one more round after having knife-cut noodles, so I ordered only two extras.
Before serving noodles, the new soup in the pot was added to the soup boiled down.
I thought the noodles are originally salty and was worried that the soup would be also salty. However, I felt relieved after adding extra soup.
However, the soup definitely looked salty.
The knife-cut noodles in the extra dish were not made by hand, but they looked nice and they were also delicious.
The knife-cut noodles permeated with the taste of soup were enough to make me full and satisfied although I was not totally satisfied with eating an entire chicken.
The following last event was the porridge made with soup and rice.
However, the problem was the salty soup.
For that reason, I ate only noodles and took the half of the soup out off the bowl.
The soup seemed to be salty and delicious, but I thought it might be too salty. I had no choice but to take it out of the bowl.
If I ate too much sodium, (I thought) it would be the worst choice for me along with eating too much chicken fat and carbohydrate.
I ate the two bowls of porridge made with one bowl of rice – actually ate only rice, not the soup – and I was so full.
With total \33,000, including One Chicken \18,000, two extra knife-cut noodles \4,000, one bowl of rice \1,000, three people in a family can get energy in this hot summer.
It would be the best menu for summer because there are no useless things in the menu and you can take nutrients you need.
Address : 12-8 Namdaemun Ro 5Ga Jung-Gu, Seoul
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