Sahn Maru And The Seoul Of Oakland
Sahn Maru And The Seoul Of OaklandBy Brian J. Kenny
I was standing in the frigid Mongolian wind when it happened. I had just offended the woman tending the pancake booth on the side of the mountain in Seoul, Korea. I had no idea what I said to cause such a reaction, but it must have been bad. Despite the fact that this precarious position could get worse, I chose to stay. The pancakes were beautiful, golden yellow and crisp, and the aroma of the oysters and green onions had me paralyzed. I suddenly cared more for Korean food than I did my own safety.
It was late January, 2005 and we had only been in Seoul for a few days. At that point in the trip, I hadn’t truly connected with any strangers. I couldn’t speak Korean, so I had to rely on body language as my sole means of communication. Unfortunately, as my present situation clearly illustrated, the body language was very different as well. I had been trying to buy a pancake for nearly twenty minutes. The cook kept asking me a question that I couldn’t comprehend. Since the restaurant was not yet open, I assumed that she was telling me that she couldn’t sell me a pancake yet because the restaurant wasn’t open. In turn I tried to pantomime that I would be happy to buy the pancake and eat it elsewhere. Perhaps she thought I was telling her to beat it; I couldn’t be sure. Whatever the case, I had been taken the wrong way and she stormed off, leaving her quiet male friend to deal with me.
Time was of the essence, the pancakes appeared to have reached nirvana; I had to buy one at once. I handed the quiet man the equivalent of $10 before helping myself to a pancake. The man graciously assisted me, handing me a cup of bright red Go Ju Jong, a spicy red pepper sauce, for dipping. I dug in immediately.
It was an intense experience. Like an Eric Dolphy bass clarinet solo, the pancake contained a startling number of notes often juxtaposed in a complex order. The egg dough was perfectly crisp on the outside, while warm and soft in the inside and the cooked white onion, radish, and carrot slices were well integrated with the dough, not too soft and not too hard, adding a perfect backdrop to the more dynamic elements. The cold wind nipped at my teeth as I bit in to the crisp but supple cake. I tasted the vinegar and the green onions first, followed by the ethereal oyster, which provided a lumbering yet delicate low end, and the round smoothness of the squid, which filled the middle of the flavor spectrum. On this foundation, the Go Ju Jong darted among the other notes in punctuated blasts of spicy sweetness that were driven by my quickening pulse and the blood coursing through my veins.
I was transfixed. This was the best thing I could be eating at that particular moment. Upon returning to the grill, the woman noticed that I had undergone a startling transformation. My plate was empty, my mouth was open, the corners of my mouth were stained with the bright red steaks of the Go Ju Jong, and I was smiling. The man said something to her and she laughed as she handed me a drink. As I quaffed the cold beverage, sweating in the epic winter wind, the woman wrapped up another pancake for me. She handed me my change, and we shook hands. “Friends,” she said. “Friends indeed,” I laughed cordially.
As I walked down the hill toward the bus stop, it suddenly became very clear to me that food, and the respect and enjoyment thereof, is one of the pillars of culture. “So what if the crazy American can’t speak Korean,” the man and the woman seemed to be saying to each other, “he LOVES Hea Mul Pa Jun, and that makes him okay.”
If you explore a certain cuisine or culture long enough, you will eventually have that breakthrough. It took me twelve years to have it with Korean food. I attribute this to the fact that restaurants are an interpretive venue and the classics, like Jazz standards, have attained their status through universal appeal. The most daring songs seldom make the hit parade and Eric Dolphy is unknown to most casual listeners of Jazz. Likewise, few people have tasted really good Korean food. In the world of Korean food, barbeque dishes are the most frequently interpreted or recited elements. The most popular Korean barbeque dishes are Bul Ko Ki, or top round, and Kal Bi, or sliced short rib. The classic Korean marinade is balanced with the sweetness of rice vinegar, the saltiness of soy sauce, the heat of red pepper, and the bite of garlic, and the nutty, smoky fattiness of sesame oil. The quality of the meat and the diversity of the Pan Chen, or side dishes, are the general dividing line between the varying strata of Korean restaurants.
Fortunately for East Bay diners, there are a plethora of Korean restaurants in Oakland alone. The oldest of these restaurants are Koryo, on Telegraph and 45th, and Sam Won on Telegraph and 27th. Koryo and Sam Won are both good restaurants, with a nice variety of Pan Chen and good meat. Koryo has always been the nicer, cleaner, and friendlier of the two, while Sam Won has always been the grittier and more colorful. However, in my book, Oghane, on 39th and Broadway, bests both of these restaurants. The Pan Chen are always fresh and the Kal Bi is tender and perfect in texture and flavor.
As good as the Kal Bi is at Ohgane, my favorite dish there is the Tol Sot Hea Mul Bi Bim Bop, a spicy “mixed-up” rice dish featuring seafood, julienne vegetables, shredded dried seaweed, and spicy chili oil, all topped with an egg over-easy. It is served in a brutally hot, stone bowl and the rice continues to cook as you eat it. The ingredients sizzle and pop as you make your way through them. Your face is warmed by the rich steam rising before you as your eyes feast upon the vibrant colors of the ingredients and the sauces. The sweet pickled sprouts balance the spicy oil, while the texture of the egg supports the oyster; it is a complete sensory experience. My favorite part is eating the tender squid pieces with the crisp sheets of rice, smoky and toasted with sesame oil, that line the bowl.
The ambiance at Oghane is impressive as well, it is tastefully lit, with stainless steel and granite, high ceilings, and clean, shiny floors. It is as nice as the higher-end restaurants in Los Angeles Koreatown, like Oo Le Ok with reasonable prices. In short, it is a great, nice restaurant.
However, my pick for the best Korean restaurant in Oakland is Sahn Maru, on Telegraph and 43rd. The menu at Shan Maru digs deeper into Korean cuisine, offering less common and more authentic dishes than any other American Korean restaurant that I have visited. While the other restaurants offer tasty renditions of the standards, Sahn Maru brings new thrills and flavors to the mix. Everything that I have tried at Sahn Maru is excellent. The proprietor, Hyung Ryul Yoo and his able staff are dedicated to their craft and the results are manifest in their outstanding Pan Chen and incredible Kim Chi.
Of all Korean dishes, Kim Chi is probably the best known. In its most common form, Kim Chi is a kind of spicy, pickled Napa cabbage seasoned most prominently with red pepper, salt, garlic, and fish juice. In a culinary sense, it is most comparable to sauerkraut or other pickled vegetable dishes ever-present in Eastern European cuisine, while in a cultural sense it holds a similar place as salsa. The flavor of Kim Chi varies based on the geography and cultural history of Korea. In some regions it is far spicier while in others it contains more seafood, but generally, it has a pronounced, spicy flavor, with a strong, fermented aroma. Most families have the own recipes for Kim Chi as well. For most of my life, Kim Chi was a most vile substance to me. I couldn’t stand its distinctive smell and I found its flavor to be startingly off-putting.
However, the day after my Hea Mul Pa Jan conversion, I had my Kim Chi awakening while eating lunch with Hana’s parents and her extended family. I was dutifully eating everything that was placed before me in order to make a good impression when the universe shifted around me. In an instant, my obligatory smile gave way to a ravenous, soul stirring hunger. I wasn’t sure of exactly what I was eating, but I was very certain that I liked it. The Kim Chi on that day featured a pronounced oyster flavor with a subtle crab undertone. It was more than just pickled cabbage; it was complex and almost contradictory. The waitress watched me devour my first plate of it, before bringing me another. As she approached the table, she made a good-natured comment to my father-in-law, who in-turn explained that this particular Kim Chi was over one year old and this aging accounted for its layered, nuanced flavor.
That was in January of 2005, and all Kim Chi thereafter paled in comparison until my first trip to Sahn Maru a few weeks ago. The rest of my Sahn Maru experience was equally enjoyable. At its heart, Korean cuisine is built around vegetables, meats, and fish seasoned with varying combinations of red pepper, bean pastes, soy sauce, green onion, garlic, ginger, sesame seeds, sesame oil, mustard, and vinegar. However, at its soul Korean Cuisine expresses the dramatic geography and the varied climate of the Korean peninsula. The restaurant’s name means “from the mountain peak” and its food reaches epic heights as well. On our first visit I had Kal Bi, Dwe Ji Gam Ja Jim, or braised pork in mild chili sauce with dates and potato, and Dak Kal Kook Soo, or chicken noodle soup.
The dates made the whole first meal snap for me. They were the perfect accompaniment to the sauce for the pork dish, which was unlike anything I have ever tasted. I wanted to drink the sauce, but it was so spicy it burned. Fortunately the dates and the crisp, Ob Beer muted the immediate sensation of the burn, rendering its lingering effects both exhilarating and delightful. I focused on the Hea Mool Pah Jan on my second trip to Sahn Maru. It rocked me. It was the only thing that I ordered and it took me some time to eat it. The Go Ju Jong was superb, as was the sweet and salty soy sauce, and vinegar dipping mix. The Pan Chen provided isolated blasts of flavor that helped mitigate the heat of the Go Ju Jong, which enabled me to taste the totality of the pancake’s broad spectrum of flavor.
I found myself lost in the meal riding the peaks and valleys of its’ waves of flavor. Korean dramas were playing on the big screen television in the corner and nobody was speaking English. For a time I forgot where I was. Then I had another realization. Sahn Maru is the Seoul of Oakland.
SIDEBAR 1 – Recipe
Simple Korean Marinade
6 parts soy sauce
5 parts chopped green onion
3 parts sugar
2 parts rice vinegar
2 parts sesame oil
Black pepper to sight
Add 1 knob of ginger if you are marinating chicken. Add crushed red pepper to taste if you want to make a spicy marinade. If you are going to marinade the meat for more that a few hours, put it in the vinegar and sugar first, adding the other ingredients a few hours before cooking.
SIDEBAR 2 – Koreana Plaza
The scene was frenetic. The checkers were burning through the items rolling before them as quickly as they could. Scanning and checking, checking and scanning while the sea of customers waited in line for their turn, the checkers worked likes demons assisting their customers with speed and precision.
There was no background music playing, but the scene provided its own pulse, its own language, and its own nuance. The two-for-one Kim Chi display battled for my attention with the $1450 bottle of Martell, safely locked in the plexiglass cabinet on the other side of the checkers. I tried to focus on the checkout process but it was no use, my attention was grabbed by shrieks of exaltation erupting from a person who had just won something in some sort of sweepstakes. There is something for everyone at Koreana Plazaa, a bona-fide Korean Supermarket, in the spirit of the great supermarkets of Seoul, in the heart of Oakland.
Koreana Market offers a dizzying selection of Pan Chen, marinated meats, Kim Chi, fresh seafood, produce, dry goods, and frozen foods. Stop in at their housewares store and buy a stone bowl to make your own Tol Sot Hea Mool Bi Bim Bop. They even have their own parking attendants.
Address Information:
Koreana Plaza, 2370 Telegraph in Oakland
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posted by Brian J. Kenny @ 8:18 PM
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1 Comments:
Total and complete appreciation for the writer of this column. Hi Brian, this is Darcys youngest daughter Alana, I met you here at daddys house quite a few years ago and just now found this on daddy. I have to let you know that we lost daddy to cancer on Nov. 5, 2007 but through you and the many many people he touched, his music lives on. Thank you so much for you caring heart to make my daddy never forgotten . God Bless You, Alananorthern@gmail.com
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