mouthfeel

Sometimes, all you want is some succulent pineapple-on-a-stick, kept cool on a rather large-ish block of ice and bought for under a buck on a hot, humid summer day in a metropolitan city.

Oh, would you look at that. Your move, western world.

니이스 컵 닭 (Nice Cup Chicken): No ddukbokgi and bland odeng combo of the traditional takeaway stand, here. Instead, the proprietors of Nice Cup Chicken serve up the perfect golden ratio of fried chicken to ddukbokgi to tater tots in a small paper cup, all mixed up with a sweet, extra spicy red sauce guaranteed to cause labored breathing and runny noses. Oh, how your snout runneth over.

For the uninitiated, ddubokgi refers to a dish made of those white dduk tubes, center front. People call them rice cakes, but they’re really more like thick, solid, glutinous pasta noodles. At Nice Cup, the dduk itself is cooked, then fried, for a crispy skin and chewy interior. The chicken pieces are lovely strips of boneless white meat prepared with that secret Korean frying technique. The tater tots kick ass simply for being tater tots. Each component in the cup could do just fine on its own, but the sum of all parts elevates three classic Korean and American junk food staples into a street dish nonpareil. Located on the main drag in the Myeongdong shopping district AND IN MY BELLEH.

The next few days promise to be a glut of work things, so I’ll just leave you with this: summer is officially here. The subways have turned up their air conditioning systems. It is warm, tee-shirt-at-night weather, heady and debilitating. Peep this street stand in the Myeongdong shopping district, serving you mini cocktails on your retail binge for less than a buck. Why the good ol’ USA condemns outdoor drinking, I’ll never know.

Watermelon truck near my place. About $5 each, but I’ve seen it for $3 in other areas.

Freshly ironed waffle, folded over a soft-serve squeeze of tart frozen yogurt and strawberry syrup, a couple dollars. Fresh strawberry juice on the side for a buck.

Your eyes do not deceive you. The corn dog batter is made of criss cut fries. Korean street food, American style, at its absolute finest.