Incheon is famous for having different food streets that only sell that specific type of food throughout the street.
It was lunch time and as I was going towards Incheon from East Incheon Station
on the western end of the number 1 blue subway line, one question popped into mind: "Should I go to the sundae-street or naengmyun-street?"
Both streets were right next to each other, making my indecisiveness even stronger.
To give you a brief summary of what these foods are:
Sundae (순대): pig intestine filled with various ingredients, most notably noodles or rice.
Naengmyun (냉면): ice cold, very thin yet chewy noodles normally eaten in the summer.
They're very different, as you can see, but it's difficult to choose one
when both options are equally available and equally distant.
In the end, I ended up walking faster towards the Naengmyun Street (냉면 거리)
almost instinctively and stood in front of an arch with words of welcome encrypted on it.
This Naeng-myun Street is specifically named "Hwa-pyung-dong Washbasin Naeng-myun Street" (화평동 세수대야 냉면거리). Many naeng-myun places label their noodles as being in a washbasin, signifying how large the bowl it's served in is.
This is how all of the noodles in this street were labelled. Despite the apparent size of these noodles, most of these places serve these noodles affordably, notably this place where each "washbasin naengmyun" is only 3,500 won.
I continued walking and saw many parking lots to restaurants and hungry customers walking in and out of several restaurants.
One particular restaurant caught my eye -- not through any unbelievably cheap prices or tasty looking pictures but rather a large picture of someone's face. The figure inside the picture was someone I knew to be an actor that featured in a Korean drama that was released a long time ago when I was young. This particular drama was a drama that my grandmother especially enjoyed watching.
Since it caught my eye, I decided I'd walk into this restaurant and see if the noodles were as nostalgic as the picture that initially drew me in.
The restaurant was named "Naeng-myun Heaven."
Expectations just rose higher as I saw the name of the restaurant.
The naengmyun was cold, just like it's supposed to be and it was okay. Unfortunately, it was the washbasin size I had envisioned.
Like it's said, if you have high expectations, you're sometimes bound to face higher disappointments. The noodles were chewy and the ice-cold broth was refreshing. It was a tad bit spicy which was a bit disappointing, but for spicy-lovers this would fit their tongues perfectly.
Around East Incheon Station, there are many sights to see and more importantly, many food streets to visit. The naengmyun street, however, is one to surely visit especially in the summer when the sweatdrops that drip must be replenished with the sweet and sour broth of this tasty delicacy.
I got to take a picture of the actor that came out in the drama that I aforementioned.
Address : Incheon, Dong-gu Hwa-pyung-dong 294-2 (인천 동구 화평동 294-2)
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