Eating in Korea has been a struggle at times.  Most things contain meat, even if the waitress claims that they don’t.  Little bits of this and that find their way into everything, so I haven’t been eating out very much.  However, a Korean friend took us out to an amazing restaurant  (Seon Bi Muk Jib) in Jeju-si the other day, and I had a mind-blowingly fantastic Korean culinary experience.

Muk is a typical Korean ingredient made from nut starch (typically acorns-yes, acorns!), causing it have a jelly-like consistency.  Here, it was served as a dumpling salad with finely chopped cucumbers and carrots with a bit of mayonnaise, and also on its own with sesame seeds.  Korean-style eating never goes light on the side dishes, so you definitely have to consciously stop yourself from binging on appetizers.

Muk Salad

After the array of small dishes, the waitress brought out two massive muk jeon- a Korean-style a pancake made from muk and a few vegetables. It’s fairly light and airy, and is meant to act as a wrapping for the bibim guksu filling.

We were served an enormous plate of bibim guksu- a dish consisting of cold noodles atop a bed of vegetables mixed with the traditional fermented red pepper paste (gochujang).  

 

For me, it was just the right amount of heat, and we all found ourselves overstuffing our bellies.  This was after several empty plates had already been removed.