of note: The Melting Pot

I met my buddy Charles for dinner last night. It's weird to realize that Seoul National University Entrance Station (which is close to where Charles lives) and my place of work next to Daechi Station are, in fact, connected by an artery called Nambusunhwan-no (남부순환로), or "Southern Ring Road" (even though it's not a ring as far as I know). But at dinnertime, moving just a few kilometers west toward SNU campus through a series of traffic lights is a slow-crawling adventure because it's rush hour. I left work at 5:30; my meet-up time with Charles was 7 p.m., and I wanted to give myself plenty of time. I also didn't want to take the subway; Line 2 at that time of day, on a weekday, is a crowd-crush nightmare (no disrespect to the Itaewon crowd-crush victims), something I found out the last time I tried using the subway to reach Charles's location.

The point of this entry isn't to describe the time I spent with Charles, though, so I'll leave out the sweaty shower sex and nostril-experimentation, the drugs that make you see beetles pouring out of your friend's eye sockets, and our post-high discussion about how much we hate Korean people. Instead, I want to focus on the restaurant that Charles recommended we visit—a place called The Melting Pot, which serves everything from burgers to pizza.

The Melting Pot follows the current restaurant trend of minimizing human interaction by giving each table its own touch-screen method for ordering food. The place is small, so our hostess was also our food runner. She somehow managed to ignore Charles's request for a glass beer goblet (I'm trying to avoid saying "glass beer glass") for his Samuel Adams, giving him the same sort of metal cup that I got when I ordered my Cokes. Aside from that hitch, though, the service was okay. We ordered our burgers and some pulled-pork fries to share (guess who ate most of the fries).

And the food was delicious! If I had two regrets about my meal, they would be (1) I wish my burger had come out with its own sides despite the pulled-pork fries we'd ordered, and (2) there was no option, when ordering, to say "no onions." I've dealt with some version of that problem since forever, though, so when my double smash burger came out, I simply pulled the onions off and gave them to Charles. Regrets aside, the burger was juicy and good, and I expressed some relief that the place didn't go for the usual cliché of brioche buns, which every YouTube and Food Network cook seems to think are necessary for a proper burger. My favorite buns? Those Martin's potato rolls, both for hot dogs and hamburgers. God, I love those. Anyway, The Melting Pot didn't use Martin's, but they did give my burger a good, solid bun. And the pulled-pork fries! The fries themselves were hot and properly crisp, and the rest of the dish was an enjoyable medley of flavor and texture contrasts: the smoky pork, the crunchy lettuce, the gooey cheese—I might have to order two of those next time.

So The Melting Pot is on the map for me as yet another joint whose menu I'd like to explore further. Very worth the trip, and not crowded at all for a Monday night next to a campus full of hungry students. The resto is located along Seoul National U.'s "Sharosu-gil"* (technically Shyarosu-gil/샤로수길, but spelled without the "y"), a sort of Restaurant Row with secondary "off-Sharosu" areas (as Charles and his wife call them) on either side, off-Broadway style, for students and other locals to check out. Charles mentioned a few other restos in the neighborhood that might be of interest during subsequent visits, so I'm pretty sure I'll be back. The Melting Pot gets an enthusiastic thumbs-up from me. When we left The Melting Pot, Charles suggested we swing by a by-the-slice pie place with the sphincter-themed name of The Pie Hole (or Piehole, depending on which sign you look at). I got a fudgy, "Mississippi Chocolate" pie with a surprisingly excellent crust; Charles got a Guinness cake that looked simple compared to my slice of pie.

The Melting Pot's front (sorry for no burger/fries pics)

the cute, slightly mysterious entrance to The Pie Hole

interior artwork—going for a cutesy, dessert-y vibe

My pie was the one located "northeast."

Again, my pie = Mississippi Chocolate—top shelf, second from the right.

So: two good, solid eateries last night. I recommend them both. I think I also need to get out more often. I tend to be like Kant at Königsberg, sticking to my routine once I've got one. It's not that I'm closed to new experiences: on that Big Five personality test, I actually rated pretty high for that quality. It's just that I quickly become a creature of habit once I discover what I like. For example: were I to go back to The Melting Pot anytime soon, I'd be tempted to order exactly what I'd ordered this last time because it was so good: it was a new experience the first time, but it'd be like meeting an old friend the second time. So if I go back, I'm going to have to stifle the urge to stick with what's comfortable since I do want to explore the place's menu.

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*Sharosu-gil (gil = street) is a riff off the ritzy Garosu-gil in the Apgujeong part of Seoul. Seoul National campus's main entrance has a huge structure that looks like the Korean syllable shya (샤). I assume that that's where the shya in "Sh(y)arosu-gil" comes from. If you want to know what the shya means, you'll have to ask Charles because no se absolutamente nada.