Lovin' from the Oven

If there's one truism about life in Korea it's that no matter how much things can seem to be like they are in Canada, nothing, nothing is ever the same.

Tomorrow is a very important holiday in Korea - it's the anniversary of the day the 35-year Japanese occupation of Korea ended (1910-1945). To properly celebrate our boss gave us a large bag of Korean baked goods. We're not sure if this is an actual tradition, or if our boss just bought too many pastries and needed to load some off on us, but we were appreciative all the same. Employers back in Canada should take note.

We decided that as nothing in Korea is "normal" as per Canadian standards, that we'd carefully document ourselves sampling these treats, and rate them on the SBG (Strange Baked Goods) scale of tastiness: 1 being "too good for the trash bin" and 5 being "we'll definitely try these again."

(Here I am holding the shopping bag full of Korean pastries.)

(Looks good enough to eat.)

The first item we took out of the bag were hard almond cookie tubes. While they look like something similar back home, they tasted like almonds and soap. Nice texture though. We gave them a 2 out of 5.

("Tastes like chicken.")

The next thing we tried were donuts, which we admit we thought would taste just like...donuts. They did not. They were a bit heavy and we think they were deep-fried along with some chicken drumsticks. We gave them a 2 out of 5 as well. If they tasted more like donuts we would have given them a 3.

The next item on the menu were fruit danishes. As Shayne put it, they're pretty hard to mess up. They do look innocent enough....

(That's right, it's coming out of my mouth, not going in.)

However, they were so bad neither of us could swallow a bite. They tasted like they'd been soaked in the vilest, cheapest of gins. We gave them a 0 out of 5.



The next thing we tried were these lumps of something or other. They tasted like whole wheat fruit cake. Not too bad, though a bit bland. They got a 3 out of 5.

(The winner!!!)

The fifth and final pastry we tried were long eclairs of some sort. These were definitely the best of the bunch, being (okay we'll admit it) the most like back home. They were sweet, sticky and flakey, and we gave them a 5 out of 5.

Well after 5 different baked goods we were left with slightly swollen bellies, a strange mix of tastes in our mouths, and a strong need for something to wash it all down. We've come to the conclusion that Korean baking is much like the rest of their cuisine: there's the good, the bad, and the ugly. But 1 out of 5 ain't bad.

Jo