There’s a lot of Nepali/Indian food available in Seoul, but there’s one food I hadn’t been able to find, and had really wanted to find, until last night. I met Miss Jiwaku in Yeongdeungpo but we discovered that Times Square was crammed with people, and every restaurant had a wait of at least 15 tables ahead of us. So we decided to try our luck elsewhere, and by chance Miss Jiwaku remembered an Indian/Nepali restaurant by the station, called Everest.
Honestly, I wasn’t blown away by most of the food: the naan was a little dry, the chicken dopiaza was odd (slightly better than my last attempt, but not much) and the thukpa was, I don’t know, much more sour than any of the savory, filling thukpa I’ve had before.
But for all that, I’ll be going there again, because… yeah, they have momos. Momos are basically the Tibetan equivalent, in India, of what mandu are in Korea: they’re flour dumplings with a meat/vegetable filling. The difference, though, is phenomenal. The meat in a momo is, I think, mutton, and I don’t know what vegetables they put in because basically it’s all ground up into a paste. And if you’ve ever had soup dumplings (like you can get at a good dim sum place), well, these momos had a rich, oily broth inside like that, slightly orange-colored and oh-so-delicious.
Momos might just be a “fast food” in India, but I missed them a lot when I got back (back in 2004) and I’ve never been able to find a restaurant that still served them (they’re often on the menu, but not available). Now, I have a place for momos.
No pictures from Everest, though (but you can see what different kinds of momos look like at Wikipedia). Sorry, I was too excited sharing them with Miss Jiwaku!