"dsi1" wrote in message
...

On Wednesday, February 20, 2019 at 1:08:51 PM UTC-10, GM wrote:
> dsi1 wrote:
>
> > On Wednesday, February 20, 2019 at 8:26:06 AM UTC-10, Ophelia wrote:
> > > ---
> > >
> > > Pah you are just spoiled <g>
> >
> > Yes, wherever we may roam, it's tough to get food like we do on this
> > rock. My niece from California says there's a Hawaiian place that serves
> > chicken katsu in her town. She says there's also 3 places open that
> > serve poke. Two of the places are good and one is so-so. That's
> > encouraging.
> >
> > For breakfast, my wife had fried pork belly with kim chee. The kim chee
> > was unusual, it was aged stuff. The cabbage gets almost gel-like and the
> > flavor deepens. We wouldn't normally eat kim chee that old but with the
> > pork belly it was pretty wonderful. Oddly enough, kim chee, bacon, bacon
> > fat, and rice, is a Korean comfort food.
> >
> > https://www.amazon.com/photos/shared...5ynavWBupV7HOA
>
>
> Another Korean comfort food is "Army Stew", it is fried Spam, kimchi, and
> rice...
>
> Spam is very popular in South Korea, it arrived with the US soldiers
> during the Korean War. Spam in fancy gift boxes is a popular present for
> special occasions, a luxury box can cost hundreds of dollars:
>
> https://www.straitstimes.com/asia/ea...ift-in-s-korea
>
>
> "Spam is no junk meat - it's fit for a gift in South Korea
>
> JINCHEON, SOUTH KOREA (AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE) - From the front lines of war
> to a staple of institutional catering, Spam is rarely seen as a gourmet
> ingredient - but the canned pink meat holds a unique position in South
> Korea as a top-selling holiday gift.
>
> Ahead of the Chuseok harvest festival which started yesterday - one of
> Korea's biggest celebrations and an occasion for mass family gatherings -
> presentation wooden boxes of the blue-and-yellow tins, nestled in packing
> straw, line the shelves of both major retailers and local convenience
> stores.
>
> An upmarket black-label pack with six cans of Spam and two bottles of
> Andalusian olive oil costs over 90,000 won (S$110), but the most popular
> version is a nine-tin set at 30,000 won.
>
> Office worker Lee Yoon-ho bought five to give acquaintances, calling it
> "the most universal" present. "It's affordable and everyone likes it," he
> said. "All South Koreans like Spam."
>
> Spam gift boxes worth a total of around 213 billion won were sold in South
> Korea last year - six times as much as in 2008, when the figure was first
> recorded. A spokesman for supermarket giant Homeplus said the tinned meat
> hampers ranked second, third and fourth in its top-selling products last
> Chuseok.
>
> "In Western countries, Spam is considered a cheap substitute to fresh meat
> and people nowadays tend to view it fairly negatively as they associate it
> with ration packs and poor quality meat," Ms Da-hae West, author of the
> English-language cookbook Eat Korean, told AFP. "Because Spam is both
> salty and high in fat, it complements the spicy, tangy elements of Korean
> food very well - particularly kimchi, as the flavours balance each other
> out," she said.
>
> Spam was introduced to the peninsula by the United States army in the
> 1950s, when civilian food supplies were running low - with meat scarce -
> during the Korean War.
>
> South Korea is the second-biggest consumer of Spam after the US, according
> to US conglomerate Hormel Foods..."
>
> https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-24140705

==

Love the wee dog Did he call it Kitty? We call cats Kitty)


>
> "Why is Spam a luxury food in South Korea?
>
> Asia is celebrating the annual lunar thanksgiving holiday this week. In
> South Korea, where it's known as Chuseok, the holiday is celebrated by
> visiting family, paying respects to ancestors... and the giving and
> receiving of packaged cans of Spam.
>
> The pre-cooked tins of pork meat are the stuff of jokes, lunch boxes,
> wartime memories and, here in South Korea, a low-key, national love
> affair.
>
> Spam has become a staple of South Korean life, and the country is now the
> biggest consumer of it outside the US.
>
> Since Spam was first launched in the US before World War II, more than
> seven billion of these chunky little cans have rolled off production
> lines - like the ones at Spam's South Korean factory in Chuncheong
> Province.
>
> Here you can find Classic Spam, Mild Spam, Bacon Spam, Garlic Spam€¦. "If
> you've got Spam" the slogan on the can proclaims, "you've got it all!"
>
> So, not for South Korean cans, a dusty shelf at the back of the
> supermarket.
>
> Humble origins
> Spam, and its home-grown competitors, are prime gifts for the lunar
> thanksgiving holiday, and they are displayed with verve, in lavish
> gift-boxes, sometimes topped with ribbon.
>
> Spam is considered a luxury item, although its origins are humble
> The premium Black Label hamper will set you back around $75 (£50).
>
> "It has Andalucia Olive Oil, and nine tins of Spam," the company's brand
> manager, Shin Hyo Eun, explains.
>
> The only way to get meat in those days was to smuggle it from the army
> base
> Ho Gi-suk, Restaurant owner
> "Spam has a premium image in Korea. It's probably the most desirable gift
> one could receive, and to help create the high-class image, we use famous
> actors in our commercials.
>
> "Anyone who gets a Spam gift-set also gets a warm feeling in their heart."
>
> Spam does have a different image here, compared with the West. Where else
> would television commercials show a young couple ditching their romantic
> dinner to head home for a plate of Spam?
>
> But its origins here are much more humble.
>
> Smuggled spam
>
> Spam was introduced to Korea by the US army during the Korean War, when
> food was scarce - and meat even scarcer. Back then, people used whatever
> they could find to make a meal.
>
> But the appeal of Spam lasted through the years of plenty and it's now so
> much a part of South Korean food culture, that it's the staple ingredient
> in one of the country's favourite dishes: budae jigae or army stew.
>
> There are lots of restaurants specialising in it, but the most famous line
> one particular street, just around the corner from a US military base.
>
> One of the restaurants there is run by Ho Gi-suk.
>
> She claims to have invented Army Stew back in 1954, when someone brought
> her smuggled spam, sausages and bacon from the local army base. Mrs Ho
> made them into a spicy soup, and the rest is history.
>
> "Back then," she tells me, "there wasn't a lot to eat. But I acquired some
> ham and sausages€¦ the only way to get meat in those days was to smuggle it
> from the army base.
>
> "We had to make do with whatever the soldiers had left over; sometimes it
> was turkey, sometimes Spam. We'd make a stew with whatever came out, and
> my recipe was copied and spread throughout Korea."
>
> Army Stew is now well-established as part of South Korea's culinary
> landscape - as traditional here as Spam gift-sets for thanksgiving.
>
> "It's salty, and greasy, and goes very well with the spices," one customer
> told me. "Korean soup and American ham - it's the perfect fusion food."
>
> </>

The funny thing about that is that I've never seen Korean army stew served
in Hawaii. It's easy enough to make so it might go over good at a party. My
guess is that you'd be a popular guy if you made it at parties. I wouldn't
do it myself but that's just the kind of crazy stuff that millennials like
to do.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mCogEWzGDQQ