Thursday, December 17, 2009

Diner Like


It is something of a luxury having a local, reliable restaurant that offers quick and consistently good dishes at a reasonable price. I am very lucky to have such a luxury.

Now, this is a very British place and I make no apologies for liking this. The dominance of America is evident in Korea and the odd spattering of a British influence makes a welcome change; Gavins sausages, London Pride and British clothes designers(Paul Smith, John Smedley, Aquascutum et al) being notable pleasures.

Diner Like sits at the top of Samneung Park, home to 3 tombs of Joeson royalty next to Seollung Station. The park is well worth a visit.

Dead kings are all very well and good but food and drink are of far more importance and Diner Like is the restaurant you want at the end of your street.

I am not going to go into too much detail as every time I eat there I wax lyrical at the SO and bore the shit out of myself. What they do right is have a space that is modern and open, they have incredibly efficient and pleasant staff and they have a menu that you want to order from.

And when you do order the food is invariably good. We are not talking fancy here, the place is called Diner Like not Michelin Starred Like, but we are talking food you want to eat. Food that you could possibly make at home but probably can't be arsed and costing exactly as much as you would be happy to pay.

You can browse the menu yourself, I have yet to be disappointed. Their burger is the best I have had in Korea, the homemade buns being spot on and the burger exactly the right thickness, not too thin like a McDonalds, not so thick as to be vulgar.
Pasta is good, risotto is good, curry is good, they make their own sausages and they have Yorkshire Pudding on the menu. Yorkshire Pudding!!!!!!!!!!!

The wine list is short and acceptable. They occasionally sell Erdinger for 5000won for half a litre. The sangria is fantastic and they sell Belgian Cherry Beer.

It really is a fantastic, locals restaurant with a consistency in quality many more notable places would be envious of.

I like it. Go there. If you don't like it, you're an idiot.

Sunday, December 13, 2009

Champagne


A Francis Bacon portrait of Muriel Belcher up there. Muriel Belcher was the owner of the Colony Rooms in Soho and in the fantastic Jeffrey Bernard is Unwell stated "Come on cunty, you're not drinking enough champagne!". And she is right. I am not.

Christmas is coming and so buying champagne is probably a decent idea.

Homeplus have the Tesco NV Premeir Cru Champagne for 44,000. A good price for a wine that has, in the past, won accolades above and beyond its price point.
They also have a Tesco Vintage Champagne for 61,000. Somewhat shockingly I took no notice of what the vintage was but in my defence I was being hounded by a rather rude member of staff.

Also, Lotte Department stores are doing Piper Heidsieck for 48,000. A decent price for a decent champagne.

Port is proving frustrating to hunt down. Bog standard ruby port is easy to come by at an OK price but a proper aged tawny port is somewhat elusive. Looks like it will be an expensive one.

Chablis Premier Cru for 55ish at Les Vins Maeils is not bad, though I am hoping for a richer style of white Burgundy for Christmas.

Half bottles of Sauternes are as tricky to find as a dvd copy of Jeffrey Bernard is Unwell which everybody really should see. Link here for a short clip as facebook won't let me embed the video here.