Just outside my neighborhood, right next to one of the local groceries I frequent, there's a street-food stand that opens up around 5 o'clock in the afternoon and stays busy past midnight and well into the witching hour. This stand sells, among other things, sosaeji, i.e., Korean-style sausage that's somewhat reminiscent of Wurst. A single large sausage on a stick costs a mere W1000, which is shockingly cheap: a puny variety pack of sausages, purchased from the local grocer, will set you back about W7500. For W7000, I could buy seven large sausages from the street vendor and have nearly twice as much meat as I'd get from buying the grocery variety pack.
The street stand is run by a husband-and-wife duo. I asked the lady, tonight, what the stand's hours of operation were, and she said that she and her husband start at 5PM and go on until 2AM. I have no idea how much business they can snag at 2AM, but it's obvious they're working hard. I bought five sausages from the couple tonight; they let me eat two of their little red-bean cakes for free as a thank-you for my patronage. If I ever decide to make some sort of gumbo or choucroute, I'll very likely visit this couple and purchase my sausages from them.
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There were many a nights when I was stumbling home from the bar at o'dark-thirty and satiated my hunger with some delicacy on a stick.
ReplyDeleteMissing Korea.