Last one in is a rotten egg!
Am I the last person in the blog-o-sphere (DANGNAMMIT I hate that word! Anyone got a replacement?) to take part in this meme? Very very possibly! I’ve watched all my favourite food blogs take part and have drooled over some of their entries and felt only mildly squeamish about others. It really is quite interesting seeing what different people have recommended on their lists, and it’s made me think quite a bit about what 5 foods that I’ve eaten in my lifetime I’d recommend that others try before they left this ‘mortal coil’ (hah - take that Shakespeare! You’re not the only one who does wordy prose!).
Since I’ve been tagged twice for this event, once by the lovely Ange and again by Payal, it probably is about time that I got off my hiney and put my list down for posterity. No drumroll necessary - here is my list of 5 items I’ve tasted that everyone should eat at least once before they die!
1. Chicken and corn broth
In particular, my mother’s. This has been a staple of my life - whenever anyone in my family falls sick, my mother marches off to the butcher and returns with a couple of chicken carcasses which she boils till the meat falls off and a most lovely chicken stock has formed. Then she adds a number of things both for health and flavour purposes - a couple of cloves of garlic, some sliced ginger, peppercorns, salt, corn, thinly shredded chicken meat and onion and boils it till the flavours have softened and blended together. The last step is her whisking some egg and then dropping it into the soup so that it cooks throughout the soup as thin strands suspended in the broth. It’s a relatively simple dish, but when I’m sick I rely on this broth to survive. It’s not just the food, but the love and care that the dish holds which makes it so special.
2. My mother’s kimchi
There are as many recipes for kimchi as there are stars in the night sky, and whilst I’ve tried many of them, none make my tastebuds explode like my mom’s. Her recipe is an adaptation of one from the women in her family, passed on generation after generation, and even other Korean families who try her recipe often beg her for it and say it’s the best they’ve ever tasted. When I talk to mom about her kimchi, she says that though the ingredients are important, more important is taking the time to do the dish justice and not rush any step, and making sure that you taste the flavours at every stage and make sure they’re coming along exactly as you want them to 
3. A freshly picked sugar watermelon whilst sitting in the sun
During my picnic on the weekend with my Strangly girls, we bought a fresh watermelon from the Queen Vic Market which was at the peak of it’s ripeness and juicy, crunchy and amazingly sweet. We all marvelled and said it was the most ‘watermelony’ watermelon we’d ever tasted, and took turns drinking the remaining juice from it’s emptied form. Refreshing and sweet and a lovely contrast to the warm sun on our backs, it felt like the embodiment of summer right there.
4. Pork ribs from Chaeju Island in Korea
The pork from Chaeju Island is famous throughout the entire country, and though majority of the island is something of a fairly expensive weekend-trip destination for the mainland, there are many people who travel to Chaeju just to eat their pork, seen as the best in the country. Chaeju is an island off the southern penninsula, and with most of the land being unpopulated, means that farmers can produce organic produce which is fresh and unlike anything grown on the mainland in terms of quality and flavour. The pork from this region has no ‘porky’ smell, is fatty and tender and absolutely melts in your mouth. The best way to eat this is over a traditional Korean barbeque, taking a small piece of pork and eating it in a ‘wrap’ using a lettuce leaf, some rice, chilli paste and a piece of kimchi.
5. ‘King’ mandu (Korean dumplings) from a street dumpling house in Korea
Anyone see a running theme here? Yeah, I likes me my Korean foods 
Dumpling houses are on almost every street in Korea, and the ‘king’ dumplings are the size of a fist and have thick, soft skins which protect any number of fillings, from tofu and Chinese chives to any variety of veggie and mince combinations. They arrive piping hot from the kitchen with a soy/vinegar sauce that you dip them in. These places are usually tiny, cramped and very very noisy, but I’d more than happily ignore all that to try one of these dumplings again.
I don’t think there’s anyone left who hasn’t done this, so I’m not going to bother tagging anyone - but if you haven’t done it yet, feel free to do this meme, just remember to email Melissa with your list afterwards as she’s keeping a list of all the entries
Technorati Tags: foodbloggers guide to the globe, food meme
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Comments
1. My wife’s mother’s kimchi.
2. Crusty French Bread
3. Blue Cheese
4. Serrano Ham
5. Cherries
Great post
Kat - hehehe, actually, the ‘king’ mandu is a little more like the chinese steamed dumplings than gyoza 
as for mandu, it’s just the Korean word for ‘dumpling’, and if they’re steamed they’re called ‘jjin mandu’ (jjin = steamed) and fried ones are called ‘goon mandu’
Erik - Thanks for stopping by 
I’m glad cherries made your posts - reminds me that we’re coming into our cherry season now! Hurrah! Nice list you have there
With you on the kimchi and melon. I loved kimchi before I even got to Korea and on lazy days in Kobe I would head to the store for a tub, fire up the rice cooker and have kimchi and rice with tea for dinner. Ah bliss!
As for the melon, freshly picked is good, but I’ll do you one better- in season, grown in your own garden and freshly picked! Then you can taste the sun. Nothing is better! Not even kimchi
I got meme’d a few months ago and reading your blog I’d like to see what you’d do with it as I enjoy your writing very much. Here ’tis: http://prettygoodstuff.blogspot.com/2006/07/meme-butterfly-effect.html
Excellent list! You have me salivating over the pork ribs and the dumplings! I couldn’t agree more on the watermelon.. there truly is nothing better on a hot summer day than freshly picked, sweet watermelon - yum!
I’ve yet to try Kimchi - but in a perfect world, my first taste would be your mom’s Kimchi.
Also.. I do not want you to be sick, but I hope you’ll one day post the soup so I can see pictures
Lis - Oh god, sometimes I dream about those pork ribs and dumplings! I think if I ever go back to Korea, it’ll be for the food As for being sick, I’m actually coming down with something at the moment (mucusy sinuses, eww) so you might see it in the coming days
Mmmm… kimchi. G*d’s way of saying “bugger off” in “food”.
Love the stuff over rice and with a cold beer.
LOL! To avoid the bugger off message, I recommend moderation, and avoidance when you have an unhappy tum. Not that I’m speaking from personal experience (yeah right!), but not heeding this advice can result in a looooooong aquaintance with the throne the next morning
hi ellie, terrific list; i am a total kimchi addict, although the stuff we get here is the furthest thing from home-made
J - Thanks hon As for kimchi, it may be a difficult dish to make, but if you love then I think it’s worth giving a try at least once in a lifetime. The time you put into making it yourself does provide better flavour than any bought variety
Paz - Cheers
lovely answers there! The mandoo that is served in Hawaii is fried, still I love them too. Your version sounds like the Chinese “gyoza”.