Words and shots by Shirley Hwang

Sushi chef Takashima Yasunori is soft-spoken and reserved, but his recipes are anything but. Since joining the W Seoul Walkerhill in 2009, he has worked on creating a dazzling new menu full of surprises for the hotel’s contemporary Japanese restaurant Namu.

His main creation is “creative sushi,” a collection of modern sushi pieces that have special ingredients delicately arranged on top of the primary slice of fish. Chef Takashima feels that with traditional sushi, much of the actual sushi taste is lost when it is drenched in soy sauce. His new sushi is prepared to be eaten from the plate in one bite; all the seasoning is in the sushi itself. This allows guests to taste the full natural flavor and freshness of the fish.

From combining tuna with garlic chips to topping scallops with caviar, Chef Takashima’s creative conceptions come from his long interest in sushi. He is originally from Osaka, Japan, a city known for its food. As long as he can remember, he has been fascinated with both the making and the eating of sushi. Perhaps it’s his role not only as preparer but also consumer that allows him to create food that is a feast for both the eyes and the palate. All of the creative sushi pieces are meticulously made with painstaking concern for design. They’re almost too pretty to eat.

In addition to creative sushi, Chef Takashima also prepares traditional sushi and omakase sashimi at Namu’s sushi bar Ice. Here he converses with customers about the food and serves them items of his choice. He has been in Korea for fifteen years as a chef and notes that while the Japanese prefer smaller and more traditional sushi, Koreans tend to enjoy larger, unusual sushi. This grasp on his customers’ preferences has helped inspire him to make innovations in sushi cuisine and culture in Korea.

Chef Takashima hopes that more people will enjoy this new “creative sushi” trend. He has created a menu for a contemporary, hip, and yet unmistakably Japanese dining experience at Namu. But you don’t have to be Japanese or Korean to pick up the chopsticks here. Chef Takashima also hopes that Westerners, who may have already tried fusion sushi back home, will stop by to experience creative sushi at Namu.

Inside Creative Sushi
Here’s a closer look at Chef Takashima’s creative sushi platter:
1. Salmon, shallot, tobiko and mayonnaise
First, mayonnaise is added to the salmon. The smooth salmon is then topped with freshly cut shallots. Finally, heaps of tobiko are added for color and seasoning.
2. Tuna, sprouts, garlic chips and cherry tomato
Crisp sprouts dressed with lemon soy sauce are added to tender tuna, and slightly fried garlic placed on top lessens the tuna scent.
3. Octopus, soy sauce dressing, cucumber and fried sweet pumpkin
Soy sauce and olive oil dressing are sprinkled on the octopus, then cucumber and fried sweet pumpkin are added.
4. Beef and sprouts
Fish takes a back seat in this sushi. Marinated and fried beef is topped with sprouts for a tasty combination of meat and vegetable.
5. Scallop, basil, chervil, and caviar
Basil, shallot, tomato, celery, olive oil, salt, and pepper are mixed with the scallops, creating a salad feel. This is finished with chervil and caviar.

This was the winning entry in the beef recipe contest sponsored by 10 Magazine and MLA in May. Rebekah Park received 2kg of Wagyu Beef (W150,000 value).

Sensational Steak Pot Pie

Recipe by Rebekah Park

I started to cook meat pies since I got married to an Aussie guy who missed them so much.

Sensational Steak Pot Pie

For 8 people
Preparation time: 30min
Cooking time: 1:30min

[Ingredients]

Australian beef: 450g of steak + 400g of ground beef
1 big size carrot, 3 stalks of celery, 2 onions, 10 big button mushrooms

Salt and pepper, Worcestershire sauce, dried thyme, tomato paste (or 1 big tomato), any beef or vegetable stock

short pie crust to cover the pot
300g of all-purpose floor, 150g of unsalted butter, a pinch of salt, 1 and 1/2 eggs

[Cooking Instructions]

Chop up the steak into small pieces
Chop up celery, onions, and button mushrooms, grate the carrot

Put some vegetable oil in the big pot, cook the meat and season it with pepper, salt, dried thyme and Worcestershire sauce as you cook it through.

As the meat starts browning, add the rest of ingredients – carrot, celery, onion in the pot and stir them all together.
Water will start to come out of vegetables. Add hot water to just cover all the ingredients and add 1 cube of vegetable stock and 3 big table spoons of tomato paste
(season to taste).

Move the pot into the oven, cook the meat about an hour at 170℃.

While you are waiting for the meat, you can work on the pastry. You should use cold butter and cold eggs.
In a big bowl, put the flour, cold butter, and a pinch of salt. Quickly break the butter and make flour and butter mix into crumble.
Add eggs into the mix and mix it quickly just enough to bring the mix together.
You should not knead the mix. Put the dough in the fridge for about a half an hour.

After 1 hour, take the pot out from the oven, drain the meat so that you can get good gravy which you can enjoy with the pie later.
Put the drained meat in the pie dish (I used 28 cm wide, 5 cm deep pie dish which I bought from Homeplus) and cover it with the dough that you made earlier.

Bake the pie for 20 min in the oven at 180℃.

For side dish, I think the best option is mashed potato, but you can have steamed vegetables or baked potato also.

Enjoy!!

Words by Shirley Hwang, shot by Joe McPherson

Chef Christian Meilinger boasts an impressive resume. After completing an apprenticeship in his native Austria, he worked with five different Hiltons: Vienna, Shanghai, Hong Kong, Tokyo Bay, and finally the Millennium Seoul Hilton, where he was executive chef for four and a half years. He then opened his namesake deli and restaurant in Itaewon four years ago. Chef Meilinger’s culinary expertise allows him to create food that is loved by both foreigners and Koreans alike.
For Meilinger, “the most important thing is that everything is fresh.” His insistence on freshness can be best seen in the sausages at his deli, which are made fresh daily by the chef himself from chilled – never frozen – meat. Regulars frequent the first-floor deli for these one-of-a-kind sausages as well as for salami and ham that have been carefully house-cured.
On the second-floor restaurant, Meilinger has created a menu with classic home-style Austrian dishes. The most popular item is the weiner schnitzel, which is coated in crumbs from the bread that is baked each morning at the restaurant. It is served with a wild cranberry sauce that is ordered directly from Austria. “You have got to try this,” Meilinger said as he offered me a spoonful. A variety of Austrian wines complement the main dishes, and the apple strudel makes for a perfect ending to a hearty, traditional Austrian meal.
In addition to keeping things fresh, Meilinger insists on providing an enjoyable dining experience for his customers. Quality is a given, but so is affordability. “I refuse to allow good food to be unaffordable,” says Meilinger, who as a chef himself had often encountered mediocre dishes being sold for exorbitant prices in Seoul and beyond. He points out that all of his main dishes, which include cordon bleu and braised beef roulade, are affordable without compromising quality.
Despite the long hours and demanding nature of running both a deli and restaurant, Meilinger’s passion for simple, good food, coupled with his devotion to his customers, is unwavering. “If a customer wants it, I’ll make it,” he says. The bottom line is “I want people to enjoy themselves and leave happy.”

Meili’s Deli and Chef Meili are located in Itaewon
on the street directly across from the Hamilton Hotel.
02-797-3820

Win W150,000 of Wagyu Beef with MLA Korea
To enter this contest, submit a beef recipe along with a picture by May 31^st to me at gs@10magazine.asia. MLA Korea will select the best recipe from the submissions and send the winner 2kg of chilled wagyu beef (a W150,000 value). You will also be introduced in the July edition of 10 Magazine.

When Wonseok Shin was a teenager, he was bitten by the cooking bug. In high school he loved cooking Western foods such as pasta and steak. Then he got involved in French literature, which led to his life’s passion in French cuisine. He journeyed to Paris and enrolled in Le Cordon Bleu academy, learning French cuisine along with American, Japanese and fellow Korean students. Korean and Japanese students were plentiful, which spurred them into healthy competition.

Chef Shin has a special place in his heart for Paris. Since it has had centuries of multicultural traffic, it has long been used to foreigners, and he felt there was little racial discrimination. He also thinks Parisians appreciate the amount of money Koreans spent there.

Even though he noticed that the French were interested in Korean food, he has had frustrations in introducing French food to Daegu citizens as head chef at Daegu’s swanky Novotel hotel. Daegu diners turned their noses up at his Gallic cuisine, saying it was too foreign and heavy.

“Daegu needs more multiculturalism,” explains Chef Shin. “This is many Koreans’ first time trying French food, but someday they will like it.”

A good example was his attempt to serve the classic French dish escargot borginon, which is snails steeped in butter, garlic and parsley. These diners were appalled at the thought of touching snails, even though they scarf them down anyway in Korean dishes such as golbaengi muchim.

Rather than continue to force classic French food down his customer’s throats, Chef Shin experimented with altering French food to his customers’ tastes. To the escargot dish, he added more garlic and some ginger. People started enjoying the dishes more.

This started Wonseok Shin on the path of introducing Korean ingredients to French techniques, creating exciting new flavors and textures. One such dish is a Pork Blanquette in Doenjang Cream Sauce, which mixes Korea’s complex fermented soybeans with a smooth sauce in a dish that sounds like something you wouldn’t mind cuddling up with.

Chef Shin doesn’t just use any Korean ingredients, however. He makes sure to source locally, getting the best doenjang, seafood and even the famous cheese from Imsil, one of the few cheese-making regions in east Asia. With this arsenal, Chef Wonseok Shin plans to woo the taste buds of Daegu citizens and wake up their palates to a world of amazing flavors.

Ingredients

• 2 L bouillon

-  2 L water
-  3 bay leaves
-  200 g onion
-  5 cloves
-  50 g doenjang (soybean paste)
-  3 kg cubed pork

• 100 g roux

-  50 g butter  -  50 g flour

• 100 g doenjang (soybean paste)
• 1 L cream
• salt and pepper
• 200 g diced and sautéed onion
• 200 g diced and sautéed mushroom

Instructions

1. Add the pork, bay leaves, onion, cloves, and a bit of doenjang to the water and boil for 40 min.
2. While it boils, skim off any froth that rises to the top. It’s done when you can stick a fork into it easily.
3. Remove the meat and slice it into cube-shaped pieces.
4. After straining the broth, add cream as you boil it down.
5. Use a blender to mix the doenjang with a bit of cream and add it to the broth and cream that you are boiling down.
6. Make the roux by cooking butter and wheat flour and add it to the mix until you reach the proper concentration.
7. Season with salt and pepper, and add the pork to the sauce again.
8. Stir-fry the onions and mushrooms separately. Add them and let cook a little longer.

Words and shots by Joe McPherson

Glancing at the vast cityscape outside the 51st-story window of Marco Polo restaurant in the COEX tower, Executive Chef Nick Flynn of the Intercontinental Seoul, thinks about the untapped potential of Korea’s restaurant scene. “You have the old chefs, who make sure everything is authentic. Then you have these new chefs, who are willing to try new things. Then you have the foreign chefs who advise on palates.”

This, he believes, is the working combination to help Korean cuisine reach a world audience. Moving to Korea has been a joy for this Australian-born chef. Having worked in places as diverse as Germany, India and Singapore, Chef Flynn has been most enthusiastic about what he sees in Korea. “The local produce is amazing. It’s very seasonal.”

Chef Flynn has accomplished a good set of feats, including winning “best new restaurant” for a meat-heavy Brazilian churrascaria in vegetarian India. His young team at the Intercontinental Seoul has won the difficult Black Box Challenge, which is like an intense episode of Iron Chef. He is amazed by the passion of Korean chefs, and that is Korean cuisine’s great strength.

Along with the strengths are the frustrations. Even though the local produce is superb, it’s not diverse enough to support the types of multi-star cuisines they serve at the Intercontinental. This requires them to depend on imports, which get bottlenecked in customs. Yet Chef Flynn and his very able staff find ways to put the best food on the table.

The other side of the coin is the Grand Cafe’s “Made in Korea” menu, which features Korean classics in a fine dining setting. Even though the food is gorgeous, flavor takes center stage. In the past, Korean diners have shirked their native cuisine in fine dining situations. Yet in the case of Made in Korea, the response has been good.

Chef Flynn came to Korea in early 2008, just as the government was picking up speed to promote Korean food abroad. He has observed its actions and has strong ideas on positive directions to take. The most effective way to cultivate a Korean food movement abroad is to invite high profile and up-and-coming chefs to Korea to show them the beauty of Korea’s homegrown ingredients and teach them how to cook Korean style. He had recently returned from a trip to Chile where the organizers were doing just that. He went from not knowing about to Chilean cuisine to becoming a passionate enthusiast.

“That creates culinary ambassadors.”

Check out Nick Flynn’s recipe for Seared Mero Fillet with Chermoula and Spring Salad here.

Lifehacking means finding clever ways to function more efficiently in life. When a chef does it, is it “restaurant hacking”? Lugo, the Seoul baby of a well-known New York City enterprise of the same name, strives for two challenging goals at once—keeping true to its authenticity while sourcing ingredients as locally as possible. To keep costs down without a loss in quality, Lugo improvises with what’s available. And the man in charge of this task is Executive Chef Mark Battle.
A native of Buffalo, New York, Mark has risen through the ranks of the competitive New York scene. He got into cooking because of his love of food and the energy of a busy, successful restaurant. He was entrusted with and has succeeded at the opening of Lugo’s Seoul restaurant.
While many chefs ignore the bounty this part of the world has to offer, Chef Battle embraces it. He says that Korea has quality produce, mushrooms, dairy and seafood: “I mean, the sea bass we get is delivered alive in a bag of sea water!”
He particularly has praise for a product in Korea that many ignore—the milk. He believes that Korean milk has a full rich character. That shows itself as Lugo takes the raw curds of a local dairy producer and turns them into silky mozzarella in the restaurant. As Mark says, “You can’t beat the taste of warm mozzarella right after it is made.”
He’s not exaggerating. For people familiar with Korean delicacies, this à-la-minute cheese is reminiscent of fresh chapssal tteok (sticky rice cake). It comes wrapped in prosciutto with sweet figs to balance the saltiness. The dishes are classic rustic Italian favorites that have a few surprises in store, like gnocchi made with semolina flour instead of potatoes and served like a polenta. Chef Battle did find the tastes of the Korean market a little different from the American one. The sensitivity to salt is greater, so the salt volume has been turned down a bit. The pomodoro sauce also has a more pronounced garlic flavor.
The restaurant exceeds expectations, which Chef Battle believes is the key to any successful restaurant. Restaurants need to go beyond what’s expected in quality, service and value. “Seoul is a restaurant city,” Mark observes, “and to stand ahead of the rest is a challenge we love to face.” Even though Mark will be leaving Seoul on March 3rd, his legacy of restaurant hacking remains for you to enjoy.

Lugo is right in the middle of sophisticated Cheongdam-dong, next to Club Circle in the alley behind Ahnsei Hospital. 02-512-0572

Words by Joe McPherson and shots by Joe McPherson and Lisa Smith†

Spaghetti Pomodoro
Ingredients
• 250g. dry spaghetti
• 625g. canned peeled tomatoes
• ½  cup of shaved garlic
• ¼  cup of diced onion
• ½  cup of olive oil
• 50g. grated parmesan cheese
• 50g. unsalted butter
• 10g. basil (cut into thin ribbons)
Method
Heat olive oil to med. Heat and sauté garlic until lightly caramelized. Add onions and cook until soft. Crush tomatoes by hand and add tomatoes and juice. Season with salt and pepper and simmer 20-30 min, stirring occasionally. Allow to cool and puree.
Cook spaghetti ¾ of the way in salted water. At the same time heat ½ L of sauce in a large saute pan. When it simmers, add butter and melt. Drain pasta, reserving water, and add to the sauce to finish cooking. Stir constantly to avoid it sticking to the pan. When pasta is cooked, add cheese and stir. Adjust thickness with pasta water if necessary. When cheese is fully melted, add basil and adjust salt and pepper to taste.
Serve in bowls and garnish with grated cheese, basil, and a light drizzle of olive oil.
Freeze any remaining sauce for an even easier meal next time around.

Think about it. Cooking at the ambassadorial level has unfathomable stress. State dinners demand the apex of protocol and etiquette. You must not only know all aspects of your country’s traditional and regional cuisines from stocks to pastries, but you must also be well-versed in international foods. This is the background of Rhiti Mostafa, who came to Korea as the head chef of the Moroccan embassy. Chef Mostafa comes from a rich culinary background . He grew up in Fes, which you could say is Morocco’s Jeonju—the culinary capital. His father has cooked for the Sheraton in Morocco, and his mother for the Moroccan king himself. Rhiti established his reputation as a versatile chef when the embassy recruited him.

Since coming to Korea, Rhiti Mostafa has made a name for himself in Korea as the owner of Marakech Night. He caters for clients such as Samsung and the local French community, who are big fans of his cuisine. He can speak five languages and learned English from his English-teaching clientele after opening his Itaewon restaurant. He has moved to a roomier, lavishly decorated location next to the Cheil Building in Itaewon. His business has grown solely on word of mouth among the French and English-speaking communities, many raving about his slowly braised tajines and cozy family-style service.

Marakech Night has done well thanks to Chef Mostafa’s clever sourcing of hard-to-obtain ingredients, like fresh mint, and masterly improvisation when they aren’t available. The menu changes annually as Rhiti introduces traditional dishes, including 70-year-old family recipes from his grandmother. Moroccan cuisine is marked by tajine cooking, slow stewing or braising of meats, spices, vegetables and fruits. His signature dish is tfaya, lamb or beef stewed with prunes and almonds and garnished with chopped egg. Meals are finished with sweetened tea, poured from high in the air to create froth.

Since the move to the new location, there has been some confusion as to whether Marakech Night is a franchise or affiliated with any other restaurants or chefs. To quell any rumors, the location next to the large Cheil Building is the one and only restaurant, so don’t be fooled by imposters. The real place will transport you to a North African hideaway, fill your nose with exotic spices and fill your stomach with hearty traditional Moroccan fare. Thank goodness there are chefs like Rhiti Mostafa who stay true to their roots and refuse to compromise to the whims of the fickle market.

SCOOP

Mostafa’s brother runs a street food truck in Itaewon selling bocadillos, Morocco’s popular sandwich.

Moroccan Lemon Chicken

Ingredients

• 1 Whole Chicken, cut into pieces

• 4 White Onions, sliced

• 1 tsp. Garlic, crushed

• 1 tsp. Parsley, chopped

• 2 tsp. Coriander, ground

• 1 tsp. Ginger, ground

• 1 tsp Salt

• ¼ tsp. Black Pepper, ground

• ¼ tsp. Saffron

• ½ cup Olive Oil

• 200 g Green Olives

• ½ Preserved Lemon

• 1 liter Water

METHOD

Mix the coriander, ginger, black pepper, and salt and rub the chicken parts with the mixture.  Put the chicken and all the rest of the ingredients, including the water, into a large pot.  Bring to a boil.  Once it boils, reduce the heat to a simmer and cover.  Cook for 40 minutes until the chicken is falling off the bone.  Transfer to a plate.  Serve with rice.

Words and shots by Joe McPherson, shots by Ethan James and Joe McPherson

The Korean New Year, also known as Seollal, isn’t complete without tteokguk, or rice cake soup.  Tteokguk was originally a special dish reserved only for Seollal, and although it has become a popular dish eaten throughout the year, the tradition of eating tteokguk during the Korean New Year carries on.  Each bowl of tteokguk eaten is meant to bring prosperity and good fortune in the new year, as well as the aging of an additional year.  Here is a simple yet delicious recipe to warm the home for the holiday.

Ingredients (serves 2):

• 4 cups sliced rice cake (preferably soaked in water in the refrigerator overnight)
• 4 cups water

• 100g ground beef
• 1T soup soy sauce (gukganjang 국간장)
• 1T anchovy sauce (myeolchiaekjut 멸치액젓)
• 1T minced garlic
• 1T green onion, finely chopped (daepa, 대파)
• 1/4 medium onion, finely chopped
• 1tsp sesame salt (kkaesogeum, 깨소금)
• 1 tsp sesame oil (chamgireum 참기름)

Instructions:

1.  To marinate beef, mix all ingredients except for rice cake and water.  Set aside.

2.  Drain the rice cake, add to a pot with the water, and heat on high.

3.  Meanwhile, add olive oil to a skillet on high heat.  Add one ladle of water to the marinated beef.  Cook until browned.

4.  Once the rice cakes start to float, reduce heat to medium and cook until the rice cakes are tender, about five minutes.

5.  Transfer the rice cake soup into bowls.  Add browned beef and remaining marinade from skillet into bowls.  Garnish with egg and dried seaweed strips.