Haejang-guk: The Korean Soup That Plans for Last Night — Epoche A2
Haejang-guk means, more or less, "soup to chase the hangover away", and in Korea it is not a joke — it is a menu, and sometimes the only thing a restaurant sells. There are places near the old markets that open before dawn and serve nothing else. Why the soup exists Because the drinking is not private. Dinner with the team means glasses filled by other people, and refusing the second round is difficult. So the morning after is not private either. If everybody drinks together, everybody needs breakfast together, and the market answers with a bowl. What is in it Ox bone broth, cooked long. The tough outer leaves of cabbage, soft by then. Spring onion, soybean paste, plenty of pepper. In the older version there are dark cubes of congealed ox blood, which is for the brave, and Koreans will tell you it is the best part. In Jeonju the same job is done by a lighter soup of bean sprouts and rice. The rule at the table Nobody says anything. You may sit down at seven in the morning with a grey face, and the person opposite — who looks the same — will not comment. That is the real medicine. The soup treats the head; the silence treats everything else.