15 February 2004

Turkish Delight ..... not!

Went searching for food in Itaewon today. Itaewon has the only mosque in Seoul, up on a hill (I've heard this is an infamous hill for other notorious reasons *wink*). It is therefore not surprising to find a small minority of muslims living in this area. For the same reason, you'll also find a butcher selling halal meat (halal : meat slaughtered in accordance to Islamic rules) here at wholesale prices (e.g. boneless mutton fillets for KRW8,000/kg), and stores selling Asian spices like cinnanom, cardamon, aniseed, cloves, curry powder etc. I even found Thai green curry powder!

I decided to try out Salam Restaurant which serves Turkish food. It is situated just next to the main entrance to the mosque. I had the lamb shish-kebab (KRW7,000), moussakka (brinjal-based dish) (KRW4,000), rice (KRW1,000), turkish bread (KRW1,000) and turkish tea (KRW4,000). They also have a set menu - for KRW15,000, you get a lentil soup, salad, main course, bread/rice and tea/coffee.

I did not have my camera with me at the time, so no photos to go with this post. Sorry!

I need to be blunt here. It was not a good meal. The "lamb" was poorly marinated, dry and tough. It should read mutton and not lamb, as they're different! The moussaka was pre-cooked and microwaved before serving. I had expected pillav long grained rice, but it turned out to be just plain rice of the Korean variety. The bread was just ordinary and the tea, the pride of Turkey, was actually just Lipton teabags disguised.

OK. I'm ranting. Sorry.

[ appendum - I found their website after posting the above ]

No comments:

Post a Comment