Dram Man

The Famous Mexican Salad

Last week I went to an anju (appetizer) cooking class offered by OB. My wife went a similar class a few weeks ago in Ichon, where she learned about draft beer storage and serving. All of these classes are offered for free by the OB people out of their self-interest (more better ran "hofs" mean more beer sold, that simple).

Anyway the food section was interesting. One of the more interesting tid-bits I picked up was it takes about 10 years for a new anju dish to get receive broad acceptance. This sounds about right, when I cam almost five years ago it was rare to see a sausage anju, now it is common in the high and medium end places, and soon it will be standard everywhere.

However I worry about the fate of food in Korea based on this one episode. We were learning how to cut fruit stylishly for the popular fruit anju. He suddenly diced about three cups of fruit (melon, apple, pear, etc), covered it with about a quarter cup of cream, and then two table spoons of sugar. OK I thought, we are making some kind of salad. I was right in a way.

To the fruit mixture he then added TWO CUPS of mayonnaise, a bit of pepper, and a handful of Frosted Flakes cereal. With me about the wretch with all that mayo on the fruit, he scooped it in a bowl and proudly announced the name of the dish, "MEXICAN SALAD!"

WHAT THE HELL!!!

posted by Dram Man @ 4:05 PM