December's things to do

Salmon sashimi lovers, here’s one for you. Mibbeudong is famed for its tomato salmon noodles – a refreshing, cold tomato broth packed with vegetables and long strands of salmon sashimi cut lengthways to resemble noodles. If you’re a little less excited over this, another popular item on the menu here is the Mibbeudong itself, a rice moat topped with a tower of mixed sashimi, uni and ikura.

Comments from our coffee experts SJ This place is owned by Coffee Libre’s Kim Byung-ki, a green coffee bean buyer; roaster Kim Do-hyun; barista Park Geun-ha; barista Song Sung-man from El Café; and the genius pastry chef Heo Min-su. It took almost a year for this coffee place to become one of the best places in Korea. David G. We Some people call this place the “Avengers of the coffee industry,” as people from diverse backgrounds got together to open this store. It is famous for its baked goods as well. Cho Won-jin Their fresh coffee and baked goods will satisfy you in every way.   Fritz is one of the few places in Seoul that will offer you the choice of paper or metal filters for your pour-over. It’s no mere gimmick: one of the five cofounders is Park Geun-ha, 2014 Barista Champion of Korea, and a 14-year veteran in the business of beans. They hold cupping sessions Thursdays and Sundays at 6 p.m. for those of you wishing to learn more about the finer points of coffee (sorry, Korean only). If the language barrier has you on the sidelines, console yourself with a pain au chocolat and enjoy the retro vibe of the converted traditional tile-roof house.

You can guarantee yourself a decent pot of kimchi jjigae, or kimchi stew, if you have decent kimchi to put in the stew. But if you’re out to create really good kimchi jjigae, there’s no limit to how far you can go. Eunjujeong is a restaurant that kimchi jjigae aficionados revere as sacred. It’s fairly difficult to find, tucked away as though hidden in the alleys of Bangsan Market. Despite this there’s a long line of patrons waiting for a taste of the savory stew. Eunjujeong kimchi jjigae has an addictive quality, and once you’ve tasted it you can never go back. It’s easy to see why the owner talks of first-time patrons and their return—they’re always bringing in some new patron. It seems 30 years of serving stew in the same location paid off; somehow Eunjujeong seems to have hit upon the optimum ratio of sweet to sour in its broth. The thick slabs of meat certainly don’t hurt, and the generous portions of vegetables provided to wrap the meat in aren’t unwelcome, either. At lunchtime the restaurant does just kimchijjigae; at dinnertime the star is samgyeopsal (grilled pork belly), with kimchi jjigae as the sidekick.