Busan Journal, Day 5

Apart from the fish market we explored on our second day, I have not yet ventured down any alleys in search of the old Korea in Busan.  

But we have been down a narrow street or two.  Tonight we ate out at Taco Family, which is two blocks down the main road from the university campus and a block north, at the  dark end of a street of better looking restaurants.

The first thing you notice about Taco Family is the heavy, clear plastic that serves as both an outer wall and a door.  Inside are four tables for four, an inner wall of real glass and wood, two more tables for four, a counter, and a small cooking area.

The owner, cook, and sole employee of Taco Family is the tallest Korean I have seen yet at 6’5” or 6’6”. He is almost too big for his kitchen, but he works there efficiently.  He is also congenial.  He smiled when we came in and said, “thank you for coming back.”

Good times, good décor.  The wall beside our table is decorated with labels from products that go into his “Mexican” menu: a plastic cheese wrapper, labels neatly cut from red kidney bean and sliced jalapeno cans, cardboard sides cut from taco shell boxes, and the like, tacked at jazzy angles with smiley face tacks.

Across the room are shelves like a grocery store with items for purchase: taco chips on the top shelf, tomato sauces, hot sauces, chili powder and seasonings on the second shelf, and so on down to table level.

All of this atmosphere, however, is secondary to the menu itself, which appears on a store-wide sign over the counter. In addition to the standard fare of burritos and refried beans are such  Mexican favorites as lasagna, Greek salad, and fish’n’chips.  Our personal favorite, however, is New England clam chowder in a bread bowl.  Just in case you are skeptical about the chowder, let me just say it is excellent.  We have had it twice – although we took the precaution of scooping the jalapeno peppers off the top before we dug in.

The impressive part is that the cook, owner, sole-employee cooks the clams up with each order.  He also cuts up his fish for the fish’n’chips on the spot.

About halfway through our chips (me) and chowder (her) tonight I realized that we had all of this and Mozart playing over the PA system.  A real touch of class in a place that has it all – friendly service, interesting environment, good prices, and great food.

There is one thing I might suggest changing, however.  If he would just get real paper napkins to replace the role of heavy duty toilet paper that sits on every table, it would mean a lot!