Korean Job Discussion Forums

[northway]

It's funny how close kaypea was.

On a side note: I'm glad my school is full of admins who lived abroad and have an awareness of how not to screw up Western food.

[cdninkorea]

Last winter I went to Yongpyeong to ski, and in the resort cafeteria they serve pork cutlet as Western food "양식". Nevermind that pork cutlet is Japanese, which makes it (geographically) less western than Korean food, but there it is and it's the only "western" food they serve.

By the way, I told the manager this, but he just smiled and shrugged.

[northway]

[jinks]

We were served jam and ham sandwiches at a busy working breakfast ('we' being mostly N.Ams, Kiwis, Brits etc.). After politely eating, and enjoying, kim-bap and han-sot for days there was almost a bloody revolution over the inclusion of jam in a savoury breakfast sandwich.

[CentralCali]

Well, this week's "American cuisine" isn't samgyeopsal, but it might just as well be. It's ddeokbokki.

[Modernist]

Last week, for the cooking portion of my ES camp, the students were to make a)fruit salad and b)sandwiches. Not really 'cooking' but given the facilities at hand...

The fruit salad was actually not too bad. Except for their insistence on including those foul, disgusting Korean yellow melons, which may actually be the worst fruit I have ever tasted.

BUT, in attempting to follow a ham & cheese sandwich 'recipe' she found on the Internet, my co-teacher got everything else--bread, cheese, ham, lettuce, tomatoes--but since the recipe called for butter for some reason, and she couldn't find any butter [guess that's a Western 'exotic'?] she decided, let's use strawberry jam instead. So the students AND teachers all smothered their ham & cheese sandwiches with jam and wolfed 'em right down.

I had to explain, quickly, that I wasn't actually that hungry [big breakfast, you know]....

[Zyzyfer]

[mollayo]

One of my schools theme days was "Sandwich Day." We gave the recipe for it, and the kids made it. I didn't know recipes were required for making sandwiches. Anyway, the recipe called for bread, mayo, ham, cheese, lettuce, and (*drum roll*) strawberry jam. What's with this insistence on jam? And the recipe also called for kiwi, banana, strawberries, and tomatoes. Why? To be placed on top of the sandwich as decoration. After my coteacher left the room, I explained to the kids that no one in America eats sandwiches like that.

[CentralCali]

And not a one of the kids believed you, either. After all, the actual teacher, the Korean teacher, said otherwise.

And, Zyzfer, I did show them the correct way to make the sandwich.

[sojusucks]

[CentralCali]

I'm sure you folks realized that this thread was going to make a comeback during the winter camp.

• Winter Camp Cooking Fun!
  
  • Last week's American food was waffles. Ah, that was entertaining. The school decided that me buying an American waffle iron for $20 was not a good idea. You see, the Korean model (worthless piece of trash that it is) was obviously the much better choice! How do I know it's a better quality item than the el-cheapo American riff-raff? Simple, friend, simple. The Korean model costs 60,000 won. Much better! Oh, don't forget the reason I suggested getting the American item was the low price and, according to the co-teacher, "The school doesn't have enough money to buy that."
    
  • Evidently, the school didn't have enough money to buy ingredients either. She purchased some cruddy flour (wich she and all the other Koreans at the school insisted on calling "waffle mix" although it was just flour). No milk, no eggs, no baking soda. Simply flour and water. Oh, in case you thought the topping for the waffle would be powdered sugar or even syrup, let me disabuse you of that notion right now. The students had a choice of two toppings, every student choosing both: strawberry jam or peanut butter.
    
  • We are now at the point where the co-teacher mixed the "waffle mix." Since "the school doesn't have enough money" for the other ingredients, she just mixed the flour and water in a large drinking glass. Having never in her life actually cooked a waffle, nor even bothered to watch the excellent video (in Korean!) I found for her to watch, she didn't actually get a good mix for the flour and water; it was quite liquid. When she poured that into (onto) the waffle iron, she ensured the waffle mix was completely covering the iron before she closed the iron. Those of you who are aware of the actual method to make this particular item will immediately know what ensued next. Yes, the mix, being practically all water, poured over the sides of the waffle iron, down the side, and all over the table.
    
  • Ah, we're not done with the entertainment yet. Although the waffle iron was equipped with a lamp, one would presume that this would be something approaching a modern idea in culinary arts. Oh, no! The thing had an indicator for "ready" (i.e., power on) and "done" (i.e., the waffle is finished) but it's basically uninformative for two reasons: (1) far too much water in the "mix" meant that you could cook it all day and you'd still have steam coming out of it, and (2) it was the very same light bulb for both indicators! You read that correctly. The "done" dome over the light bulb is decorative: one half of it has "ready" on it and the other half has "done" on it. They both light up at the same time because it's the same bulb!
    
  • I foolishly asked her a couple of questions. For your enjoyment, here they are and the answers.
    
    • Q: Why aren't you mixing milk and eggs with the flour?
      A: We don't have enough money for that.
      
    • Q: Have you ever cooked waffles before?
      
    • A: No. But it's easy.
      
    • Q: Well, why don't you let me do this? You're putting far too much water in there. It's not going to work.
      
    • A: Men don't know how to cook. This is the right way.
  
  
• Tomorrow's American cuisine is, and again I kid you not, bibimbap. Next week's American cuisine is ddeokbokki.

Wow.

[northway]

I guess they blew their budget purchasing the crab for your summer camp's peanut butter and banana sandwiches.

[jpe]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IoTAb34rLso

[carnivalbeauty]

[NYC_Gal 2.0]

Yesterday, we were making tuna, mayo, and sweetcorn sandwiches. Now, I love this sandwich, and eat it back home or whenever I'm in the UK. I was excited to teach the kids how to make it. My boss (who I adore--no sarcasm there. She's great,) decided that the kids would also like to mash and add sweet potato to the mix. The kids loved it. I told them that I thought it was yucky, and had my sweet potato on the side, the way Darwin intended.