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Start
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Pureun Sup
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Songwon
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Garden
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Farm Pension
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Winter Festival
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Lee Hwa Won
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Songwon Makguksu
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Petite France
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Star Light Festival
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Finish
In Gapyeong, one of the most popular, typical region products is 'Pine nut'. Especially, Chukryeong mountain has over 80 year-old pine nut trees, so in this region, there are many restaurants cooking with pine nuts. However, there are not many dishes with much pine nut because it's very expensive. It is usually used for the garnish or supplement. This restaurant is especially well known for tofu menu. Let's try savory tofu having ground pine nuts!
There are several famous restaurants around The Garden of Morning Calm which is also famous in Gapyeong. Among them, I headed for 'Songwon Jat Dubu Boribab(Pine nut tofu and Barley rice)'. This place is famous for tofu dishes, good atmosphere, and simple taste. I was curious if it was really tasty as is well known.
I don't know if it was recently opened or got renovated, but anyway, I liked overall mood of the restaurant that was originally a traditional house. The restaurant was decorated fancy and clean. It would very crowded at lunch time with many tourists visiting the Garden of Morning Calm, because this is very famous restaurant through word of mouth. It was around 3 pm. on a weekday so it was quiet. Good!
There are only two kinds of dishes, 'Jat Dubu Boribab Jeongsik(Pine nut bean-curd and barley rice set)' and just 'Boribab(Barley rice)'. We ordered 'Jat Dubu Boribab Jeongsik(Pine nut bean-curd and barley rice)' for two people to try bean-curd. It costs 15,000won per person.
After waiting for my meal, I was served an abundant meal. It looked tasty with nicely presented food in antique bowls.
It's a tofu stew. The stew full of tofu in which pine nuts are put. It's boiled on the table. It was good to eat hot soup while boiling it on the table in the cold winter like today. I could keep feeling warm when I had a meal.
This tofu stew is a spicy soup with hot red pepper and broth made of seafood. The stew tastes more delicious and refreshing with extra tofu with pine nuts, and various kinds of mushrooms.
Tofu with pine nuts in this restaurant is handmade. Pine nuts are not ground. They are put into the tofu as it is, so you could chew the pine nuts in tender tofu. It tastes so good.
The second tofu dish was 'Jat Sundubu(Soft tofu with Pine nuts)'. Handmade Soft tofu filled with rich pine nuts tastes simple and savory. It was a perfect appetizer.
'Meat' is the best food to get energy. There was no bad smell of pork and it was tender enough after boiling. You could eat the pork with spicy shredded radish mixed with pine nuts. It seems tofu cuisine goes very well with pork.
You could put a slice of pork, some spicy shredded radish, and savory pine nuts on a lettuce leaf and wrap it, then, eat it. It's called Ssam; rice and condiments wrapped in leaves of lettuce, cabbage, sesame, or other green. It was a special 'Boiled pork slices Ssam' that was little spicy because of shredded radish and savory of pine nuts. It was great!
Gapyeong is located in Gyeonnggi-do(Province), but it's easy to try 'Memiljeon', Gangwon-do's traditional food, because Gapyeong borders Chuncheon, Gangwon-do. It was savory Memil Jeon(Korean Buckwheat pancake) made of bitter taste of Memil(Buckwheat) and aromatic, chewy shiitake mushroom. They went well together. It was little hard to cut it into small pieces with chopsticks, though. ^^*
There are many restaurants of Soft tofu stew with pine nut around the Garden of Morning Calm. This restaurant features barley rice and six kinds of herbs in a bowl. You could try Bibimbap with barley rice that mixed with barley rice in a big bowl and light seasoned herbs that you could feel original tastes of ingredients.
Normally, we eat Bibimbap with red pepper paste, but for Barley rice, it's better to eat with soybean paste sauce. Soybean paste sauce is made of some normal soybean paste, some red pepper taste, and different kinds of vegetables. All the mixed ingredients go together. It was simmering being cooked in an earthen pot. It tastes wonderful.
How to eat it? Just put six kinds of herbs much and a spoon of soybean paste sauce on barley rice in a big bowl. Then, mixed them altogether and eat it. You can choose any way to eat Bibimbap, just add whatever you like and mix them together!
It's well a harmonized Bibimbap with chewy barley rice, various flavors of herbs, savory soybean paste, and spicy red pepper paste. I didn't have to eat other side dishes. A bowl of Bibimbap with barley rice was full enough for a meal and its taste was good enough.
It was late lunch and I was very hungry, but I could have various delicious food; Tofu stew with pine nuts, Boiled pork slices, Memiljeon(Buckwheat pancake), and Bibimbap with barley rice. Even though I had much food, I didn't feel bloated because the dishes were simple and not strong-tasting.
Right beside the restaurant, Songwon, there is a Charcoal Grilled Spicy stir-fried Chicken restaurant which has been on a KBS TV show,
Address : 949, Haenghyeon-ri, Sang-myeon, Gapyeong-gun, Gyeonggi-do (경기도 가평군 상면 행현리 949)
Telephone :031-585-5571
Open hour & Holiday : 10 am ~ 10 pm. Always open(Closed on hoiday)
