fishies fishies and more fishies!

how do you eat your fish? if you are american, the options you might have encountered might be: pan-seared, grilled, broiled, blackened (i first saw this version at miami, FL at Joe's Sea Crab. weird, it sounds like burnt to me), and you get a small portion of fish flesh on your plate cooked to your matter of choice, either buttered or with some creative sauce that often masks the true fish flavor. other popular options are sushi, a raw, thinly sliced fish flesh artfully placed on top a small oval shaped ball of sticky rice, or sashimi, which is literally raw fish. or, if you are from amherst, you might have seen the bland, dry chunks of something called fish served at our infamous Val.

do any of these look like real fish? they might smell super fishy and taste super fishy, but do they look like fish? now, if you come to korea(as i did a week ago) you order fish anywhere, and what you will get(not including sushi) will be a dish that actually looks like a fish with its head, tail, gills all vividly observable, complete with goggling fish eyes and fish eggs and intestines inside. now thats the ultimate wholesome fish-eating experience.

nobody sells fish chopped up. they sell it whole!

i believe this general style of eating fish in korea is so simple and yet economical both for the environment and for us. no fish going to waste! able to taste all different parts of the fish! and you can actually see for yourself what part of the fish you are eating. generally, the fish we eat this way are not that large, we're not talking about tunas twice the size of my arm sitting on the dinner table or hairtail(갈치 in korean, or cutlass tail, king-of-salmon according to naver dictionary, do they not eat this fish in the US? its very common in korea hm.... we usually chop this up and boil it with korean spices) but mostly moderately sized fish about the length of my hand: mackerel, yellow croaker (ok i dont think naver dictionary useful here:

selling fresh fish at nearby department store.

조기 for those who can understand), pomfret/butterfish (ok, 병어)..... i decline to explain more. come to korea people.

so the usual way is: you clean the fish, sprinkle it with simple salt (or sometimes a simple sauce concocted from soy sauce, ground red pepper, sesame seed, etc.) and pop it in the pre-heated mini oven. the fish roasts in its natural oil (the infamous fish oil) and comes out with crisp, crackly slightly golden skin ready to be devoured with our eager chopsticks.

todays morning fish. (:

other ways might be boiling the fish in a red bean paste spicy sauce with chopped potatoes, daikon and garlic. the sauce integrates into the smooth flesh and becomes moist and flavorful. yum.

a sad update is that i have been spending most of my time at my new internship and haven't the time to utilize and reclaim the ownership of our fully-equipped kitchen, nibbling away at cold burgers and limp fries trying to ignite an awkward conversation with new people. but the silver lining is that my mom takes pity on me and provides me with the most hearty, extravagant breakfast ever. for instance, yesterday i met with hot, steamy bowl of rice, mallow (아욱...) stew with huge shrimps, roasted mackerel, freshly steamed mini-squids, and other banchans. of course, before this i had already drank a full cup of blueberry, kiwi, tomato, banana smoothie and after this i had half a grapefruit. so i guess that makes up for the rest of my day.

i would have loved to include some pictures to share my experience, but i own a simple folder phone in korea (not fully equipped with a high-tech camera) and my camera is currently out of order after my brave attempt to shoot myself ziplining (i did it successfully with D's camera afterwards harharhar). will try to upload at least more lively photos later after my camera is fixed. to be continued...