Hello! from Hannam: Better than Wally World

Yesterday was a very exciting day. We went to Costco! It was the end of my first week here, so why not celebrate by venturing out to see what surprises a Korean Costco could hold, in an effort to fill the kitchen with some bulk Western comforts! There are actually multiple Costco locations in and around Seoul and all are accessible by subway or bus. In the name of adventure, RCP wanted to try out the subway, so we chose the location southeast of Hannam, in the Seocho-gu area...only after a bagel and creme cheese breakfast of course.

The SunRich Cheese Cafe, a delightful establishment across the street from home,
specializing in cream cheese and bagels and various pre-packaged cheeses and cheese cake.

Cheese is extremely expensive here, because Koreans don't eat a lot of it,
but they do know how to make cream cheese....and sell bagels imported from NY.

Real H&H bagels.

Tough to buy them by the bag though, because they were all

pre-packaged individually, nice and sanitary.

Obviously cream cheese and bagels hasn't caught on here.

No giant mounds of cream cheese like in deli's back home.

Beautiful presentation, no whopping NY size dollops of cream cheese

overpowering the bagel, it was all delicious....

...and New Yorker approved.

Now onto Costco!

After breakfast, we spent about 45 minutes trying to find the subway station, which shockingly is not that close to U.N. Village. Everything else is so convenient, why wouldn't that be? During the search, we did encounter some picture worthy establishments.

The Happy Cafeteria.

The Chicken Hof.

Not sure of the name, but they specialize in beef parts other than your standard steak and ribs.

Need to remember this place for my more challenging recipes.

Still no subway station to be found.

But we did find King Crab.

Are we there yet?

Why join the private gym at work when you've

got all the public parks?

We think this machine works your core.

Found the subway.

Nice, clean, not crowded, and so much better

than New York City transit.

So much better.

Aaaahhh! There it is!

I would equate seeing Costco in the distance as we got of the train, to the Griswalds driving up to Wally World....but much more exciting. For those of you who know NYC, the subway trip took about as long as it does to go from 86th St down to Wall Street; a trip you wouldn't make often, but definitely bearable (and easy) when needed.

The warehouse carries about 50% Western products and 50% Korean. Yes, they carried the gift boxes of Spam, giant tins of red chili pepper paste, and the only way they sold peaches and apples was in gift box form, but everyone seamed to be buying them. Vitamins also seemed to be a popular Korean purchase...we're talking baskets of vitamins. And for nearly the only two American's there, it had everything we needed! Staples like balsamic vinegar, diced tomatoes and frozen fruit and then some real treats like Cheerios, tortilla chips, picante sauce, deli turkey, and cheese that wasn't a small fortune. We were quite impressed with the meat department and procured some beautiful filets at a reasonable price (even though it was a feeding frenzy since Koreans love their beaf). The check-out process was like herding cattle, but extremely quick and efficient and the employees were very helpful to the two Americans who were purchasing three times what everyone else was. The two big successes of the trip? Dr. Pepper for me and Chivas Regal for RCP.