Korean Food – Empaz

Chicken Feet – A Tasty Little Mouthful

We were on the hunt again for the most shocking and disgusting item we could find for our dinner, we settled on chicken feet. Some of us had tried this before in China or in UK Chinese restaurants, others hadn’t. After 30 minutes popping in and out of every samgyeopsal restaurant in Chonnam National University Backgate asking for ‘Dakbal‘, chicken feet or when all hope was lost, miming feet with my hands, we found somewhere that said ‘neh’.

We went in and cosied up around a small bbq grill table and took in the new paint scent of this recently opened restaurant. It was underneath my favourite Thai restaurant; ‘Thaiholic’ and I’d never noticed this place until now vis-a-vis it must have been new. Shops and restaurants come and go so quickly in Korea, a place can be there one day and literally be gone the next so you’re never totally sure what’s on your own doorstep.

We ordered a mixed platter which included pork cuts, chicken feet and then, well, God only knows. We stocked up on beer and soju for it was Friday and we got cracking, shots all round! We needed soju to mentally and physically prepare ourselves.

The chicken feet and pork came on the grill ready to be plonked straight over the hot stones. A kidney dish of something that looked like kidney or liver was placed down on the table with the direction that we were only to cook it once we’d eaten all that was on the grill currently. So be it. We got grilling.

The sides were uninspiring. The usual, kimchi, beansprouts, soups and silk worms. Perhaps that’s why I drunk more soju than usual! The pork and the chicken took a little longer than we were used to and when the very attentive waiter finally said it was ready, we dug in.

Cameras were at the ready to catch the first moment it hit our tongues, we bit in. I think we were all surprised by how tasty it was! The bones had been removed, unlike the ones I’d had before where you had to suck the skin off the bones, this one you just popped straight into your mouth and chewed. The marinade reminded me of a spicy barbecue sauce and was right up my alley, until my body caught up and realised just how spicy it was. The hiccups started as is the case when I eat anything particularly spicy and I had to pause and spend the next 20 minutes downing water (and soju – best cure!) The others agreed it was very spicy but carried on nonetheless. The pork was a normal samgyeopsal cut and was tasty so after the hiccups subsided I went for more of that and then reverted back to the feet, but more carefully this time!

After we’d abolished the pork and feet, we turned to the kidney dish. We plonked the contents on and google translated the item on the menu. It was rectum. Of course, it was. We cooked this for a VERY long time. Then chop sticks came up, rectum was skewed between them and mouths opened, eyes closed with a grimace of grim expectations. The groans erupted and for the first time ever amongst my friends in this group, it was quickly spat back into the kidney dish. It was just foul. It actually tasted like what I imagine bottom tastes like. I don’t think one of us managed to chew the whole thing down, the taste grew as you chewed and conjured up all sorts of disgusting images of what you were eating. After much soju to wash away the taste, we stumbled out into the fresh air, rating chicken feet high and the rectum pretty dam low! Who’d have thought!?

Gopchang (곱창) It’s Intestine Time!

As part of our newly founded ‘Korean Food Club’ (KFC) for short, we decided it was time to try Gopchang aka intestines. Offal isn’t something that I am a huge fan of but for some reason the attraction of trying something weird and new, overshadowed my certainty that I probably wouldn’t like it.

We found a kooky little restaurant down a back alley in distant part of Gwangju, I say distant, it was probably Sangmu but distant for us based in Chonnam University Backgate. We walked into the restaurant and sat down. Expecting grills to cook our intestines on, we hurriedly asked the waiter before all the sides came, if this was the correct place. He gestured to a connecting door between the two buildings and ushered us into the next restaurant. Weird, I know, but this isn’t the first time in Korea that we’ve sat down in one restaurant thinking it was another.

We sat down and ordered the first thing on the menu; I left this to our friends who spoke more Korean than I did. We ordered a mix of meats including the intestines, for 4 people. There were 6 of us and we agreed we’d order more if we loved it. I am so glad we only got 4 portions!

It came and looked really quite appetizing. It was essentially a steaming hot plate of different bits of meat with veg surrounded by bread that I guessed would soak up the meat fats whilst it cooked. We waited for the meat to cook and our, very friendly, waiter kept checking on us and eventually told us we were good to go, get stuck in! We were armed with A LOT of soju and beer to get us through this meal and boy, did we need it.

There were 4 different bits. The first was a small cylinder, it was literally a tube. This, I guessed, was the intestine. This was ok when it was hot, chewy and had a tang to it. I guess how you would imagine eating a tube of skin would be. Then there was a fatter, shorter tube that had fat all the way through the middle so you couldn’t see through it. This one had the fatty surprise that burst into your mouth as you bit into it. Again, not too bad really when hot, tasted a little like a fatty bit of crackling or something. The burst of fat into my mouth was a little too much for me and I declined more of these bits going forward. Then, there was the only bit that looked like a slice of meat, and this wasn’t bad at all, it tasted strong, perhaps a little like liver – which at this point, we assumed it was! Finally, there was the square thin bit of skin; this I assumed would be like crackling. Wrong, wrong, wrong. This was the toughest thing I’ve ever eaten (different to the hard texture of Hongeo, fermented stingray) and whilst chewing on it I realised it would never end. I hate to say it but I spat it out. I chewed this tasteless, fatty bit of skin for nearly 5 full minutes and when I spat it out, I could see I hadn’t even made a dent.

As we ploughed our way through this extravaganza including of course, the usual array of sides, we noticed that it started to go cold and congeal. This is when the reality set in and we realised just what we were eating and started to question why. The fatty parcels didn’t taste as bearable, the skin started to stick to the pan and the tubes start to wither. The meal had come to an end.
It was only the next day when our friend looked up the meal again to check what we’d had that we found out the truth. I was of course, delighted to hear that the only bit of it I’d actually liked was heart, not liver. Joy of joys!

An awesome meal experience though, it was so much fun and didn’t taste too bad at the start. So I would say give it a go, have a try but eat quickly!

A Simple Eel Dinner

Our first Sunday night in Gwangju. We wanted dinner. We wanted something simple and cheap. Five minutes down the road, we spotted a Korean restaurant. We entered and were briskly welcomed by staff who automatically plonked down some water and a few sides of pickles. Looking at the menu on the wall, we realised we had no idea what to order. Luckily a drunk Korean guy stepped up to help us.

Introducing himself to us and asking lots of personal questions about us, he finally turned to food. What would we like? ‘God only knows’ we thought looking at the scribbly Korean characters on the wall. I slowly tried to read the first and shortest word on the menu. Wrong thing to do. He picked up on the word I was trying to read which was incidentally ‘Changa’ in romanized format. ‘Yes!’ he shouted excitedly, ‘yes, good choice!’ He went on to order us two of them, plus sides and finally two rice each.

Now we just had to wait. Sides just kept coming. More and more and more. Salads, pickles, fish cakes, cabbage, kimchi, weird balls of stuff…what was the actual main we thought?! Whilst waiting the waiter stalked our way with a colander of live fish flapping about under his hand. I froze thinking he was heading at me with them. Luckily, he shot past me to the table behind me who had a hot bbq grill ready and waiting. With aplomb he threw the live fish into the pan and the whole restaurant heard the sizzle! Again, we thought, ‘what is our main’?

Finally, it came out. Two long grey lengths of fish were laid down on the burning hot stone grill in front of us. The silver skin simmered as the long gutted fish lay there cooking. Eel. Who would have thought on entering that this would be our simple Sunday night meal? The eel was cooked and then chopped into manageable chunks and lettuce leaves were brought over. In typical Korean style, which we didn’t know too well at the time, we added the eel to a lettuce leaf we held in our hand, added pepper sauce and other sides and then ate it all in one. It was yummy. Not something I would have predicted. The drunk guy wouldn’t leave us alone once the Eel came. ‘How is it?’, ‘Mmm?’, ‘Give me your number’ – which my boyfriend did. He even drop called him to check it was the real number. Luckily, the English phone number didn’t work in Korea. Score!

We left the restaurant full and pretty surprised. We were 60 dollars worse off and wondering if we would have food poisoning on our first day of school. Even so, we were happily bemused, knowing we’d left with a story to tell. Until we saw the other Eel’s in the tank out the front. Long, black fish squirming about like blood-sucking leeches. My stomach turned slightly as we walked away praying for the day we had data and google translate on our phones.