Dinner at "the 4500"

Yes... that is what you think it is... your eyes are not fooling you... Matt has donned a mustache for "Mustache March." And now it's been documented for posterity :) It's a pilot thing... no one really understands it. Just wait for "No-hair November" and the return of "Flat-top February"... the squadron is filled with a bunch of look-alike Top Gun extras. Hilarious.
Saturday night we ventured out to a place near our house- fondly called "the 4500" for the W4500 signs in the windows and posted on flags outside. The restaurant is very clean- seating is either at western style tables or traditional Korean tables where you are seated on the floor.

There are 4 categories of things on the menu- besides a picture of of a cow, pig, a grill and a bowl.
The menu is written in Hangul- with the exception of two items: "Ribs of Beef" and "Ribs of Pork". So... we ordered two orders of the beef ribs. The waiter turns on the grill embedded in the center of the table and starts bringing a parade of side dishes.

You can see the beef on the grill- cooked at our table, then cut up with scissors by our waiter. Evan reaching for the chilled, marinated bean sprouts. He just plucks off the yellow seed heads and discards the white roots. Each of us ordered a personal dish of rice (bop). On the right you can just see the edge of the pickled radish dish- pink radishes the size of turnips. Evan ate two of those. Also served as a side dish: pickled jalapenos, iceberg salad with "thousand island" dressing, chili paste, loose lettuce leaves, a chili/zucchini/tofu soup- spicy!, and KIMCHI!




In the foreground of this picture- lower left is a salad of julienned sweet white onion, red leaf lettuce, green onion stems and celery. It is served swimming in a rice vinegar dressing- very tasty. On the lower right is a sesame/fish stick/chili paste side dish... none of us ate that. Box on the left contains large spoons and chopsticks. Small dish was used for slivered raw garlic which we moved over to the grill to roast for a bit to take the edge off before we ate it. The empty black bowl is filled with 1 c. of a BOILING ox tail broth that is then topped with a whipped egg and green onion mixture. The egg mixture is cooked by the boiling broth and after 10 minutes is cooked to a quiche-like consistency. Evan ate the entire bowl... And here's what the second bowl looked like when it arrived: See video below.

The meat is eaten, wrapped in a lettuce leaf with a bit of chili paste, raw garlic, and a pinch of the salad greens and dressing. I add rice too, just to calm down the spices. The Koreans can fit and entire wad in their mouths- Matt and I have to take two bites to fit this pseudo-sushi roll in. It's quite tasty, very healthy, tons of fresh vegetables, and all the side dishes are "free" with the meal. They a constantly refilling everything. All side dishes are shared. Did I mention the entire meal cost $12... yes, $12. For all-you-can eat spicy veggies, salads, egg "quiche", and two strips of beef! Awesome!