Gyoja

If you could only see the queues at Gyoja, a decades old restaurant in Myeong-dong, Seoul. From the tiny dining room to the corridor right out the front door to the lane and snaking round the bend, one has to see it to believe it.

We arrived just before noon for lunch and the place was already packed. Fortunately, the line was just starting and we were shown our seats after a ten minute wait. Mum and I cramped into our seats, a table for four, shared with two Korean gentlemen in suits. We promptly chose to have the dumplings and knife-cut noodles, two dishes from their menu of four. Yes you did not read wrong! This well-known restaurant has had only four selections to choose from since 1966. What they do, they do well, that's for sure. Those must have been the best dumplings I have eaten in my life. Meaty, moist and full of flavour.

A day later while walking along the same lane, I overhead two tourists from Hong Kong lamenting the fact that they could not locate the famed restaurant which served wonderful dumplings and noodles. I jumped, uninvited, into their conversation and took it upon myself to show them the place. I was rewarded with multiple and incessant 'thank you's. I guess it is always nice to share a good thing.

Our meal at Gyoja in Myeongdong, Seoul, Korea.