1.240
2 (Thu) September 2010
Garlic Roast Chicken
1.5
at Kkanbu
-Sinsa, Gangnam, Seoul, Korea-
with MtG
MtG had suggested that we check out the traveling Korean-Mexican fusion taco truck Grill 5 that had been making a bit of noise on the internet recently. Based on the original Kogi brand from Southern California, which had spawned copycats across the US, the Korean version was also a knockoff, at least the menu items and the method of tweeting their location for the evening. Today, they tweeted that they’d be across from Hyundai High School in Apgujeong by 21:00. But they were running late, still hadn’t arrived by 21:30.
We were hungry. So we dropped by a new chicken and beer joint near the rendezvous site. In our hunger-induced daze, we were lured by the packed house, which is often meaningless in Gangnam where people are dumb enough to eat anywhere with a “fancy” interior design; and by the “fancy” interior design, all modern and minimalistic, which should’ve been a dead giveaway, but we weren’t really thinking straight at the time. In any event, we ordered the “garlic roast”: a few wings and pieces of breast meat, all dried out from the rotisserie, topped with some kind of mashed garlic. 16,000 won. Ripoff.
Completely disgusted with ourselves, we quickly paid and went back around the corner to give Grill 5 another shot. A short line had already formed, idiot customers taking photos of themselves waiting like they were at some gala event. We were order #8. After nearly an hour, including the wait time to order, we stepped up to the counter as they were bagging up our completed order. Then the cops showed up and shut everything down. We asked if we could have our food, since it was already paid for and wrapped to go. But no.
