The weather has been absolutely gorgeous this weekend! Ahh~ I feel like spring is finally on its way. As is only natural and expected with the coming of spring, people came out of hibernation to bask in some sunshine, myself included. On Saturday, I met up with my friend who lives near Itaewon and headed to the much-anticipated 'Fermentation Celebration' event held at Craftworks Taphouse & Bistro in Noksapyeong. We got there about an hour into the event and the space was already p-p-paaacked! It seemed like every expat and hipster in Seoul had gathered in one spot. The organizers obviously did an amazing job creating buzz for the event with cute posters and the promise of plenty of home-brewed beers, kombucha, kefir, makgeoli, kimchi. Who knew that aged foods and healthy bacteria could cause so much excitement? :) poster design by Dawn Kang
Boiling over with people...
For $8,000 won each, my co-worker friend and I got to go around tasting the different samples and chatting with all the knowledgeable peeps serving up the goods. It was really great to see so many in this expat community doing their thang, expressing their passion for tasty handcrafted fare, and eco-friendly living. Getting to chat with so many friendly folk and hear about their home laboratories and fermentation experiments was truly the best part, and it was like being part of one big happy community.
There was an impressive list of different brews for sampling. I tried the Colorado Amber Ale, which had an earthy, robust, assertive flavor. I'm not much of a beer drinker, so I can't exactly speak much about the fine points of how this tasted, but it was surprisingly good. Simply knowing that it was home-brewed and vegan, was definitely awesome.
Brother Finger Pickles
Two samples of polish pickles: spicy & plain. Both awesome, not like those typical sweet pickles you get at Korean restaurants.
I was thrilled to get to try kombucha for the first time! I've seen this all over the interwebz, and have been curious as to what all the hype is about. There were three different flavors: persimmon, kumquat, and berry. Do you even have to ask what flavor I picked? Persimmon ofcourse!
Not exactly sure what all the health benefits of kombucha are, but this tasted good!
The homemade kefir (not vegan) & makgeoli table. I actually signed up to get some starter for kefir and kombucha (I wanna try making vegan kefir!), so I'm suuuuper excited for that. I have no idea how to do it, but I'm gonna try!
Jonna & Ben who hosted the rad Veggie Club rooftop potluck last year were also in attendance, armed with a variety of fusion-style vegan kimchi, and three different kool-aid pickles!
Yes... dill pickles dyed with sugary kool-aid. Apparently this is a Southern specialty? Sweet, sour, and radioactive in color, to bring out the kid in all of us. :)
I was reeeeally happy to see this booth - the nut butter table! There were 8 different flavors of home-ground nut butters, ranging from maple almond to peanut & chocolate butter. Ahhhh! I tried several flavors, all fully awesome. This got me thinking that it's time to bust out my blender and start making my own nut butter again. It's been a while.
Phew! So that pretty much sums it up. It took a while to make it around the entire room and get samples, but we successfully got to try almost everything that was vegan. I was actually hoping to try some vegan cheesecake which was rumored to be there, but unfortunately, there was nary a cheesecake in sight. :( Oh well, it's all good~
I also ran into plenty of friends who showed up too, and even met some readers of this blog! hehe. I'm always so flattered when I meet people who already know my blog, although I get a bit self-conscious too. teehee~ It was a really awesome time though, and I hope they do something like this again.