Not Your Typical Cafeteria Food

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So, let me start this off by saying that I love food. If I had a choice, I would eat all the time. The only draw back is that awful thing of eating too much of something and then having the result of getting fat. There is something comforting about food. You know, sometimes you just canโ€™t pass up French toast for dinner with a big old slab of bacon. Another thing I like better than eating, is finding a great deal. Well, if you are like me, you are in luck! You can get good food here in Korea for a great deal! Tonkatsu for under $5.00 USD! Wait, are you telling me I can get a slab of lightly fried piece of pork for under $5.00? What does it come with? It comes with a bowl of cream soup, rice, slaw salad, kimchi and pickled radish! It can be yours for only โ‚ฉ3000 ($2.52 USD). You had me a tonkatsu.

Letโ€™s take some menu choices from Dongguk University and the University of New Mexico. Letโ€™s compare a delicious breakfast at the University of New Mexico. Waking up and you have 15 minutes to get to class. Thatโ€™s just enough time for a quick stop at Blakeโ€™s Lotaburger in the Student Union Building. I would order usually go with #1, the Bacon Breakfast Burrito (itโ€™s in caps because it is just that great). Donโ€™t forget to add the green chili because thatโ€™s what you do in New Mexicoโ€ฆperiod. So just for the burrito, it would cost you around $6.00 USD. It is made with a warm, fluffy tortilla, scrambled eggs, bacon, hash browns, cheddar cheese, and Hatch green chili. Itโ€™s totally worth it! Mouth wateringโ€ฆ.. Ok, letโ€™s talk about Donggukโ€™s breakfast choice. Itโ€™s typical in South Korea that breakfast food like cereal and breakfast burritos are not very common. So, if you canโ€™t eat piece of fried pork or a pile of fried rice for breakfast, breakfast here might not be your best friend. At Dongguk University, the options flow on a rotation. So one day you might have bibimbap or fried rice. This day was bibimbap day! For a yummy bowl of bibimbap, it would cost you $2.10 USD. This would include also a bowl of miso soup, yogurt drink (vita yogu), kimchi, and pickled Korean radish. Bibimbap is a bowl of beef, bean sprouts, lettuce, gochujang sauce (sweet, red pepper sauce), and other veggies. It is a load of food for the money, and you will not be caught being hungry after. If you are, the nice ajummas will happily give you a little bit more food, free of charge. I am not going to tell you which one is better, but all I am going to say is this. Food is an awesome way to see a countryโ€™s cultureโ€ฆ and food is just fun to eat.

This is just cafeteria food folks, I haven’t even went to the hundreds of other restaurants outside of the university. That will in another post that will surely make you hungry. I am getting hungry just thinking about it. Well, I was not blessed with a high metablosim, so I gotta go work off all that rice I just consumed. Until next time.

์•ˆ๋…•ํžˆ ๊ณ„์„ธ์š”.

Austin – ํ™ฉํ˜„์„ธ (That’s my birth name!)

 

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Korean Spaghetti
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Fried Rice with Korean Fried Chicken
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Bibimbap
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Kimchi Fried Rice with Ham (Spam)
Austin Johnson

Hi! My name is Austin Thomas Hyun Sei Johnson. I am a junior at the University of New Mexico, pursuing a double major in History and Asian Studies. I am studying abroad in Seoul, South Korea at Dongguk University from spring 2015 to fall 2015. My goal is to finish up my Asian Studies major while over in Korea. I was adopted from South Korea when I was six months old. I grew up in California, later moving to Idaho and then to New Mexico. I chose to study in South Korea because it has always been a dream of mine to visit the place of my birth. I plan on visiting the orphanage where I was adopted from and the hospital where I was born. I am excited to experience the South Korean culture and history. I plan on going for my Masters in Korean History after I graduate the following year. My plan is to teach Korean History at a University. Studying abroad will help enhance my knowledge and give me great cultural experiences that I can use later in my academic career. I look forward to learning the Korean language in the intensive language course offered at Dongguk University. One of my other goals is to be proficient in the Korean language so I may teach it to my future children. Also, I am super excited about eating all the wonderful and delicious tasting Korean food!