After visiting Yeosu, the city where I grew up, I headed to Namhae, my father’s hometown and where I had spent a lot of time when I was young. Since the road to the small village of Namhae winds through mountain paths, I had to rent a car to get there. The journey past Namhae Bridge led me to the seaside and places I used to visit often during school vacations and though many years had passed, it didn’t feel unfamiliar; instead, memories came back clearly. It’s a very beautiful part of Korea and even years later it’s still pretty.
I chose a lodging on the shore surrounded by pine trees, with a refreshing breeze coming in from the ocean. It turned out that the owner knew my father! He visited in the evening with his mother and brought warm sweet potatoes as well as some of the famous spinach grown in Namhae’s fields. His mother knew both my father and mother well.
I couldn’t help thinking about my father, who not only grew up here but is buried in the nearby mountains. I cooked meals he would have loved, which was easy because I had already bought all the local ingredients in the Namhae county market on the way in.
I was visited by my good friend Ms. Im. I met her in Toronto in the early 2000s, but now she lived just a few hours drive away and came to see me for lunch. Seeing her again in Korea in 2015 was a wonderful gift, and her smile and passion for fresh fish rejuvenated me! This video is part of my Real Korean Cooking series, filmed in Korea in 2015 after I completed my first cookbook, Real Korean Cooking.
Recipe Notes
Here are the recipes seen in this video:
