St. Paddy's Day

So on Tuesday Latanya and I were in full force celebrating St Patrick's Day. We went to school wearing green and explained the holiday to our co-teachers. It seemed that no one had any idea what in the heck we were talking about. It seems that the people closer to Seoul know more about the holiday than people on the outskirts.
It's been a two year tradition of Lt's and mine to cook traditional Irish food on St. Paddy's Day, and have some Guinness or other Irish brews. We met after work and went to the local butcher to pick out some corned beef. We then realized we were not entirely sure what corned beef actually looked liked. We have bought it several times before at home, but there was always a sign that said corned beef. I thought that it's a little stringy so we made our best guess. We chose a cut and got 600 grams worth, whatever that means and were on our way (sorry, still trying to figure out the conversion).
Next we had to pick up some Guinness. We made sure to make a stop at the local Family Mart right across the street from our apartment. Family Mart is similar to any convenience store in the states, it's open 24 hours. So if we ever have a late night craving or run out of Beer or Soju we know we will always be able to go across the street to get more. Once we picked up the brew we headed home.
We already had cabbage, bacon, mustard, butter, and potatoes from our shopping the day before. We were unable to find horseradish so we had to do without. Latanya started to cook and I helped a little bit. From then on it got a little interesting. First off the strips of bacon we thought we bought was not really bacon at all. We actually cannot confirm it's true meat family at this point in time. All we know is that when we put it in the pan the strips started to turn white and hardened. The meat did not shrivel up or turn dark in any sort of way. So we decided to toss the mystery meat and make do without; even though cabbage without bacon is just not the same.
Next item of non-Irish authenticity, we started to cook the meat and it began to cook just like a regular cut of beef. The stringiness that we thought we saw in the cut was all of a sudden non existent. It looked like small pieces of filet in the wok. Since they looked like good cuts of beef we seasoned it with our Outback seasonings, delish.
We then found out the mustard we bought was not like regular yellow mustard but honey mustard instead, boo. Lacking flavor and spice (without mustard and/or horseradish), Latanya made an executive decision. She decided to add curry powder. It was the greatest idea ever. I know many people know I love curry, any if you don't, you know now. So adding curry made me so excited. The traditional Irish meal we set out to make ended up being a most delicious combination of Indian, Australian (really American) and Irish food. I was in heaven. I had some of my favorites; meat, potatoes, curry and beer.
Once the cabbage was done we served it up and set the table....Oh wait, we still don't have a table. Our only other option was to set it all up on the ground. But all was O.K. because our Guinness was cold and our chopsticks were ready. Chopsticks? Yeah you read it right, chopsticks. What could be more Irish than chopsticks. Well, we don't have any forks so we were left with our chopsticks, which just added yet another culture into the mix. We sat down, legs crossed and dug in.
Latanya was worried it was not going to taste good. She worried for no reason because it was delicious. I ate every last bite. I think she was just aiming for our usual St. Paddy's Day feast. It was a new take for the holiday and a success. We did not have too much to drink because we had school the next day. I know not the usual St. Paddy's Day for us. But it was one to remember for sure. 2009 St. Patrick's Day the year of the Indian/Australian (really American)/Korean/Irish combo. Cheers!!!
Dan N Tan