Spicing it Up a Bit

Tons of fresh veggies and fruits
available at all the local fruit stands.

Living for so long in a place with an oven-less kitchen meant my meals were becoming quite mundane.  Cooking for one every day certainly didn't help, either.  My menu, give or take the occasional spaghetti or soup dish, more or less boiled down to stir-fry.  Vegetable stir fry and chicken stir fry (thanks to the bag of frozen chicken breast in my freezer) comprised the majority of my diet.  

Needless to say, I miss having an oven!  I am a baker.  A baker of desserts and chicken dishes and pizzas, oh my!  

Also, beef is EXPENSIVE here.  And turkey is literally nowhere to be found.  Hence, the monotonous frequency of chicken in my diet.  

Gorgeous Garlic Shrimp

In light of having a vitamin deficiency, and a lack of excitement every time dinner rolled around, I decided to splurge a little on my grocery trips and make Tuesday nights my night to cook a new stove-top recipe I would find online.  A lot of stir fry options abounded on Google, but I pushed beyond them and found some dishes that went just a step out of my normal range.

Week #1) "Gorgeous Garlic Shrimp" aka shrimp with lots of butter, garlic, pepper, and onions - with a microwaved potato on the side!  (Again, I miss having an oven!)

Over-Easy Salad

Week #2) "Raspberry Ginger Chicken" which tasted a bit like oriental chicken due to the amount of soy sauce included in the recipe. [Not pictured.]

Jeff's Smoked Salmon 

Week #3) "Peppercorn Tuna Steak" was the intention, but as I realized I picked up the wrong cut of fish and was cooking for a friend, I decided to fall back on the shrimp dish I still had the ingredients for.  It was just as good the second time around!  (We used the reduced orange mayonnaise mixture I had pre-made for the tuna dish to use as a dipping sauce for a baguette I picked up from a  

local bakery.) [Also, not pictured.]

Week #4) "Korean-Style Salad"  I'm not sure this is technically Korean style, but the egg-over-easy on top reminded me of the way many traditional Korean dishes are prepared.

Week #5) Jeff's special treat: "AMAZING Smoked Salmon Dish" with homemade garlic aoili sauce, garlic and mushroom pasta, and a baguette to top it all off.  We ate EVERY last drop.  His cooking is by far the best thing to have ever happened to my kitchen!

Restaurant

Welcome to a very uniquely-shaped dining experience!  Architecture is typically boxy and basic in Korea, but Jeff, Phobi, Ji, and I managed to find an exception to the rules.

If you glanced up, you caught a glimpse of ... the moon?

The dome-shaped ceiling was also host to some spectacularly non-ancient hieroglyphs!

If you dared to look down, it was all water!  Seriously.  The restaurant was situated right along a lake, and they made sure to make great use of it!  The restaurant was glass-bottomed. And just in case there weren't enough fresh-water fish swimming underfoot, they had a centrally-located aquarium that was stocked and florescent.

Our food was the delicious, traditional Korean barbecue: loads of veggies and different cuts of pork all cooked up on the grill right in front of you.

When the meal was over and it came time to leave, we wound our way away from the tables and found the check-out counter.

They kept the eclectic theme going, as we found a giant American buffalo nickel hanging above the cashier.  

With the great location, creative design, and yummy food, we couldn't help but wonder... why were we the only ones here?!

My Favorite Playground Equipment!

Jeff and I decided to take a break from the busy city on a beautiful, sunny day!  We just intended for a hike, but Korean hills/mountains often have little surprises waiting for you up at the top!  And who doesn't love swing sets! (Even if they are set ridiculously low to the ground and you hit your feet each time you pass by.)

Money

Jeff and I have been talking finances lately and have been learning quite a bit from family members, friends, and blogs (whoa, Mr. Money Mustache!).  As a result, we've gotten all excited about researching, exploring, and planning our best course of action for the remainder of our time in Korea.  (It's been quite the project, as you can see by my notebook full of ideas, options, and number crunching - along with my scrap papers on which I jotted down my monthly spending habits.)  I'm determined to make a dent in my student loans, yet!

We've all heard it a million times - "Every dollar counts!"  Hence, we started our collecting jars.  Jeff's jar is on the left: his leftover cash at the end of each week that he had budgeted but didn't spend.  Mine is on the right: all of my leftover change from convenience store purchases, etc.  

As you can see in the "Before" photo, my jar was teeming with coins!  Unfortunately, I can't take any credit, as the girl who lived in my apartment before me, for some heavenly, unknown reason, left a TON of change in a hat.  Before she moved, she mentioned leaving me a few household goodies instead of throwing them out.  I was in for a super pleasant surprise when I came across all of the change she had been collecting in a big , fat safari hat!  I deposited the chunk of change at the bank for a grand total of twenty-some dollars, and have started fresh.  As you can see by my "After" photo, rebuilding the stash has been slow going...

Before

After

New Student

One of my sixth grade classes had an extra surprise in store for me today.  I was about to wag my finger at one of the boys for bringing his milk into class (no food or drinks allowed!), when he quickly guarded his milk carton.  It turns out, we had a new student, in the form of a tadpole, visiting our class today!  (I was a bit concerned when I first glanced  in at it, though, as I was still under the assumption that he had brought milk to class.  Not something a person typically hopes to see in their beverage!)