Cycle 16 – Item 59
5 (Wed) March 2025
Post 5,538
Great King Chicken Legs
1.5
at Tacoreana
-Munjeong, Songpa, Seoul, Republic of Korea-
solo
Tacoreana is a Mexican-Korean fusion restaurant. Offers a handful of tacos and bbq options. Despite appearances, it seems to be independently owned and operated.
While visiting Tera Tower for the first time (to get servicing for my Macbook), I was surprised to find that it housed so many eateries, at least 30, maybe 50. Most of them didn’t look promising (Korean, franchise), but a few places might be worth a shot.
Among my countless culinary pet peeves, one of the most trivial is when a restaurant mismatches (a) type of food/beverage + (b) type of eatery on their front signage. Like here: BBQ & Pub. Other examples that I’ve encountered: Brunch & Osteria (see 12.173 Pesce), Meat & Pocha, Odeng & Izakaya, Chicken & Hof. When I pressed MtG about “Brunch & Osteria,” he explained that they serve brunch (during the day), but also serve wine (during the evening). “Then why don’t you call it ‘Brunch & Wine?'” I asked. To which he replied, “Because it’s more than just wine.” I’ve asked W, and she also doesn’t see a problem with it. I believe that Koreans don’t sense the incompatibility of such couplings because parallel construction is not strictly enforced in the Korean language – for example, listing adjectives with nouns, or mixing verb tenses.
The food was not good. The sauce was okay, sorta like the glaze for spicy Korean fried chicken, but not as sweet. But the chicken was crap: the vaguely smoked flavor and slightly dried out texture made me suspect that it had been sourced by the restaurant in cooked form then deep-fried in the kitchen upon order – though still a bit cold in the middle. The sides were laughably amateur, straight out of jars. Can’t really say that I was disappointed because I hadn’t expected much.
A return visit is highly unlikely.
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