826: Korean Drinking Culture Got the Book It Deserved with Irene Yoo

10:32Irene Yoo:Exactly. And it was obviously a great time to be sharing about like food in general. So that's when I really started like to be like, OK, I'm going to take this and run with it and see how far I can go. So around the same time was when my partner, Nick, he's been in the beverage world his whole life. So he was previously the beverage director at Nighthawk Cinema for, I think, like a little over a decade. And he and I were always like, maybe we can like open a bar. So it kind of made sense, this like synergy of like, he'll do the drinks, I'll do the food. I was also starting to really explore like what Korean, sharing about Korean drinking, because that wasn't really like a thing that I was seeing.

11:17Irene Yoo:And so it kind of all happened at the same time with like opening this bar, sharing content online, writing more about it, and then also eventually writing this book.

11:27Nick Dodge:It's incredible, the journey. And you see it in like real time. The kind of the IQ of your viewers and your fans about Korean food has just increased rapidly. Yeah. Cast iron has been a staple in kitchens for generations, and Smithy is bringing that tradition into the modern kitchen. They craft vintage-inspired cast iron that, unlike the rough and bumpy cookware you may be used to, is polished smooth for a naturally nonstick cooking surface that only gets better with time. As a listener of This Is Taste, we're excited to offer you free U.S. shipping on your order with the code THISISTASTE. Whether you're searing the perfect steak, baking cornbread, or cooking Sunday breakfast for the family, Smithy Cookware is built to perform for a lifetime.

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15:19Nick Dodge:Wedding season, bachelorettes, rooftop birthdays, August doesn't slow down and neither do you. Pre-alcohol keeps it that way. Visit zbiotics.com slash taste or use code taste for 15 % off. That's zbiotics.com slash taste for 15 % off. Let me ask you about kind of thinking about this as a book. soju party because you know i've written a couple books with dookie and you know the drinks portion was always in the books but i always felt like i couldn't give it the service i didn't have the expertise of course personally wasn't drinking for the second book and honestly there was just so much happening in korea that i didn't know you've done this work i feel that this book is so important to pick up like if you're interested in korean culture and food because like the drinking culture is such a, it's like a seamless weave into eating culture and dining culture.

16:13Nick Dodge:And I learned so much about soju production, makgeolli. So when did you realize that this needed to be written?

16:20Irene Yoo:Yeah, I agree. Like originally this book, I was approached about writing this book as like a Korean cocktails book. And I was like, yes, but there's so much more we have to say. So I agree that like, I would see a lot of cookbooks and there would sometimes be a drinks portion. And I think drinks are such a great way to infuse flavor and tell stories. But there is so much lore and history and like ritual and things behind Korean drinking in general. So I was like, well, we have to like tell the whole story and then we can go from there. And then like book two can be like, let's do cocktails or let's like continue to like evolve what it is.

16:57Irene Yoo:and also for me like i think when in approaching korean food or like my writing or whatever i always start from a place of like curiosity like i'm like why why is this the thing like for me it was like where does like soy sauce come from or like you know where does soju come from and so it kind of starts with that question and then i kind of since realized like oh this is something a lot of people don't know like if i don't know it as like a korean person a korean american person So a lot of the things that I share are so obvious for a lot of like native Korean people, but are really kind of terrifying for Korean Americans, like Korean adoptees or for just people experience Korean culture for the first time.

17:44Irene Yoo:So I wanted to showcase all of that. I wanted to be like, here are all the quote unquote rules. And then you don't have to follow any of them if you don't want. It doesn't really matter. That's the whole point of drinking is so that we start with the rules, but that we can just get rid of them. And then I also wanted to share about like Korean drinking games. Korean hangover culture is so important to me. That's something that I have been experiencing and indulging in since I was a child. My parents don't drink, but my mom loves hangover soup. And so we had been going to these like, like I just see like old man hangover soup spots at like 11 in the morning, like every time we go to Korea.

18:24Irene Yoo:And that's just like a culture that I was immersed in, even if I wasn't drinking. Like Jogetang too? Yes, exactly. Love that so much. Jogetang is my absolute favorite Korean anju.

18:35Nick Dodge:Yeah. Yeah. Absolutely. It's like absolutely important to note anju with the drinking and the hangover gears. And segmenting it through the five chapters is really cool that you organize it that way. I think one question I want to get at is the soju bottle and the soju alcohol content. First off, every bottle is green except for like one or two. So why? And then how is the alcohol content decreased over the past decade in these products?

19:05Irene Yoo:These are great questions. And these were like questions I was also asking myself. So if you read my book, it literally has those questions. Like, why is it green? So it's green because the Korean government, I mean, one thing you have to remember is that the Korean history of food as it is is very short because it was so immensely affected by the Korean War. And so in order to reduce production costs and preserve resources, they started to just like standardize like, OK, all bottles will be blue or brown or green. So originally was originally blue or brown, which was like one was for home use, one was for commercial use.

19:44Irene Yoo:And then those got really flattened into just like one color, which I think was blue. And then all of a sudden, one day, one company called Green was like, we're going to make a green soju because it seems fresh and natural. And people are like, oh, my God, how dare you? But then that went super popular. And then everyone followed suit. So all the bottles were green for decades and that really helped from a production cost and recycling perspective. interesting yeah so they just all the businesses collect the bottles as is and then they get returned to all of the soju manufacturers regardless of what labels on them and then they just wash the labels off fill it up and like slap on a new one until recently where Jinro kind of did the same trick where they're like well we want to be special we're going to make a blue bottle and it was a retro throwback to that original blue bottle and then it was It's definitely a little bit more of like a marketing technique, which then went very popular.

20:47Irene Yoo:And so there's since been, I think, a little bit more of like a loosening of the green bottle production. And the alcohol percentage thing is definitely something that's changed a lot. And that was something I remember my uncle saying when I was a kid being like, oh, the soju that you're drinking now, it's like not as strong as the ones that we're drinking now. I was like, surely that is like a boomer thing. But it's true. Part of that is because they're trying to cut costs and there's not much that goes into soju. Like the bottle is 30 percent of the cost. And then otherwise it's ethanol and flavorings, especially for most of like the commercial soju that you're getting.

21:27Irene Yoo:So in order to improve their production costs, then it's like they're watering it down. There's also a little bit of like they're trying to make it a little bit more like palatable, trying to sell more bottles.

21:42Nick Dodge:Is there like a conscious public health initiative in Korea in the lowering of the alcohol content?

21:47Irene Yoo:Not really. Not really. And it's not really advertised.

21:51Nick Dodge:Yeah. You brought it out in a chart. And I was like, this was so illuminating to me that they've dropped it a percentage almost every year.

22:00Irene Yoo:Yeah.

22:00Nick Dodge:Down to like 16 now. I mean, it was like.

22:03Irene Yoo:It went down all the way down to 12.

22:04Nick Dodge:Went down to 12.

22:05Irene Yoo:Went down to 12. And now it's kind of started to come back. Okay. And people were definitely like, this is just water. Yeah. It's so, I mean, keep in mind that soju is so cheap. It's like$2 nowadays in Korea used to be like barely a dollar. Barely a dollar. And it was something that I think like they were doing in a really like kind of sneaky fashion. But in order to keep the price the same while, you know, like through the different like recessions or depressions that the economy was having. But now there's a bit of like a resurgence back towards like increasing the alcohol percentage.

22:45Nick Dodge:With the premium soju too. Yeah. And like the 30 and 40 ends, you know, those brands are becoming more popular, I would imagine.

22:53Irene Yoo:Yeah. And a huge part of it is just like public taste too. Yeah. I think there's less of like a, oh, you have to drink less alcohol to be healthy mentality in Korea because I think similar to, let's say, like British pub culture, like drinking is not as much of like a taboo as it is in some parts of American culture. So soju is something that has always been meant to be very easily accessible. So understandably, companies have to like make concessions in order to make keep it cheap. But then there's also been a return to traditional soju, traditionally distilled soju. And then also the Korean palate has really expanded.

23:34Irene Yoo:Whereas before in the 80s and 90s, like we were really only drinking like soju, really light beer and makgeolli. Now people are like drinking wine, drinking whiskey. So I think like people are now a lot more open to trying and experimenting with drinking and making traditional soju.

23:50Nick Dodge:Let's zoom out for a sec. And for our listeners who haven't been to Korea and can't maybe wrap their heads around the way food and drinking flow together in harmony in a way that's really unique. I think I'd love to get your description of like there's always food and there's always drink and there's always drink and there's always food. That's my thought. I mean, there's cocktail bars, obviously, but there's always anju there too. So describe that kind of harmony in Korean culture.

24:22Irene Yoo:Yeah, absolutely. Like when I was writing this book, that was something that I also insisted on is that like it can't just be all about alcohol. It has to be half has to be an equal amount of food. And that's because there are so many different categories of food that are associated with drinking. So there's anju, which is drinking food. There are specific pairings, but also like, for example, there are specific pairings like soju and pork belly or makgeolli and jeon or beer and chicken. but also ultimately anything you eat with a drink is anju like it could be a bag of chips it could be ramen it could be bread like it truly doesn't really matter but there is such a huge like culture of that when you go out in korea it's kind of the opposite of america where in america let's say you go to like a comedy club you have a two drink minimum in korea you go out to a restaurant and you have like a two dish minimum and like, cause the alcohol again is so cheap and it's a lot of like spicy food.

25:24Irene Yoo:It's a lot of noodles. It's a lot of soupy things, which I think is something like maybe Americans like don't relate to as much. But we love like, my favorite is like taking a shot of soju and then like drinking like a spoonful of like spicy clam broth, which will get tongue. That's my absolute favorite.

25:40Nick Dodge:I love that combination. I love the clams and pepper.

25:43Irene Yoo:Yes. And yeah. That's like the clam broth back.

25:45Nick Dodge:the clam broth oh it's a great pairing um i love the the way it always is working together and it feels like while drinking is convivial it's part of like business culture in korea that's not as common in america it's controlled in a way and the like binge drinking culture seems to have maybe phased out slightly. And I think food is a huge part of that. Food is always there and you're always kind of doing a round of food and a round of drink.

26:18Irene Yoo:Yeah, exactly. Like the whole concept of like cha, like il cha, yi cha, which is kind of how I like structured the book too, is that like you're starting with like a lot of food and some drinks and then you move on to another spot where maybe you're having cocktails, there's more food. And then a third spot where you're doing like another round of food and drink and so there's you always have to order food even if you're not hungry you're like no way could i be putting another thing in my mouth but when you're drinking you do need that like kind of like ballast yeah to soak it up and then also like yeah like you keep drinking and you get hungry again yeah that's like the thing that kind of like prevents your hangover or then like the last like ta like ocha is like you either go to like the convenience store and you get some like snacks or hangover cures to take home with you or you go to like a hangover soup place and then you have that you hit that and then you go home then you go home

27:14Nick Dodge:and then you maybe have a hangover in the morning you have do it again something great in the morning do it all over again let's talk about beer fascinating topic you mentioned early on it was mostly light beers and a couple national brands where are we at now in korea with with beer is there more of a craft beer movement happening definitely beer is such a product

27:34Irene Yoo:of western influence on korea it was something that was brought in by the japanese during the japanese occupation and all of the local korean brands were mostly started by japanese companies and so you have like your cost your ob your height so those are all classically very light beers and but we're seeing that change a lot more again through a lot of western influence or also just global influence in general um there's a lot of german influence on like korean beer we call our like beer pubs hoffs which which is a german um borrowed word which you see in america too i mean

28:13Nick Dodge:yeah exactly golden hoff is a restaurant we also had that hoff on on 32nd that upstairs hoff Exactly. Yeah.

28:20Irene Yoo:So, yeah, we're seeing more beer being made in Korea in the past decade, I would say. Magpie is one of my favorites. Yeah, me too. Yeah, those guys were just in town, actually. They're doing really fun things where I think since it's so new, a lot of Korean companies are just exploring with like trying different styles of beer. But Magpie is doing the thing that I love, which is we're infusing different flavors, very Korean influenced flavors into different styles of beer. A lot of like there's like a really fun like green plum saison and like just different. There's like a persimmon beer, like that sort of thing.

28:58Nick Dodge:Can you get Magpie at Orion?

29:00Irene Yoo:You can. Oh, that's so cool. We sell that Cezanne.

29:02Nick Dodge:That's amazing. I had no idea. You should go there. Yes. Listeners, go to Orion. It's so cool. Do they have any NAs in Korea? That's been my one question always. I know Haight had a 0-0, but are you seeing anything interesting in the NA world?

29:17Irene Yoo:They definitely have more NA beers and NA alcohol these days because I think one thing we're seeing just globally is that people are drinking less. They still want to have fun, but they don't want to always be like committing to 10 % like IPAs. So, yeah, we're saying like I think every major beer brand makes an NA in Korea. You can't always get it here. But yeah, I don't know that it's like interesting. I think it's like a non-alcoholic version of the beer. Which is good.

29:47Nick Dodge:Let's talk about the marriage of soju and beer, Somek. It's like the national cocktail. National cocktail. You write some great lines about it, great pages, and you kind of break down the different ratios. It's really fun.

30:00Irene Yoo:Yes, there are several spreads dedicated to it. There's also a chart for proportions.

30:05Nick Dodge:So good.

30:06Irene Yoo:So essentially, seomek is just soju and mekju, which is Korean for beer. And it's a way for Koreans to either kind of water down their soju, if you're not someone who's like, for whom alcohol is not very palatable. or conversely make your beer more alcoholic, which is probably why I do it. Or it's just like, you know, sometimes it's tiring to always be doing like the shot and the drink. So there's different portions. I would love to do just a one-to-one, which is very intense. Yeah. That's a little bit scary. Hardcore. For people, that's the top. But I would say it's probably usually like, there's specific Korean beer glasses, which are like 250 milliliters, I think.

30:46Irene Yoo:And so usually I would say probably like half a shot of soju to half a glass of that that glass of beer is like the golden ratio where you're not

30:56Nick Dodge:really tasting too much of either yeah it's um can make the night uh kind of go away in blackout time

31:03Irene Yoo:but yeah exactly but it's also such a fun entry point because there's also so many ways you can make it like you slam it with the spoon koreans are really obsessed with like foaming up their beers because they believe that that prevents it from foaming in your belly and making you full and gassy. That's so interesting. Yeah.

31:22Nick Dodge:True scientifically, what does your research say?

31:26Irene Yoo:I feel like it just makes it flat. I don't know that it tastes better. Like, does it make me burp less? Yeah. Probably. Yeah. But it's also just going in the same place.

31:37Nick Dodge:I know, I know.

31:37Irene Yoo:So I don't think that scientifically it really holds up. But it is fun. I do love to slam a spoon into a beer glass.

31:45Nick Dodge:It's a fun tradition. And of course, like Soul Train as well.

31:48Irene Yoo:Yes. Lining up all the beers and then dropping all the soju glasses.

31:51Nick Dodge:Yeah. Great photography in the book, by the way. Thank you. Yeah.

31:54Irene Yoo:That's all Hemi Lee. She's an amazing photographer.

31:57Nick Dodge:Major credit for this book just coming to life with great photography. I'll have to ask you about corn and queso because corn and queso has been on Korean menus since I've been eating Korean food for about 20 years. And you see it in Korea. You see it in America. You see it all over the world. doesn't feel like native to Korea, but somehow it's always been there like on a pocha or just any like restaurant format. What is your take, your research of how this became a Korean dish?

32:25Irene Yoo:I feel like Koreans have such an interesting relationship to corn as they do with cheese. So it's like the great amagulation of the two. It's important to know that Korean corn is different than American corn and that this specific corn, cheese, queso situation is American corn. So Korean corn is more like glutinous. It's that, you know, that like multicolored corn that you get like on the side of the road if you're like... Like popping corn. Yeah, it's that kind of corn. So it's very chewy and it's not that sweet. But when Koreans got introduced to American style corn, they were putting it on their pizza.

33:01Irene Yoo:Like love a corn on a pizza. It's like not pizza without corn. So I think that's where it comes from. and then I like really started with Korean barbecue where when you do Korean barbecue they have those like little wells where they put like eggs to make steamed eggs and then corn cheese was sort of like the early 2000s like evolution of it and then that became just such a popular and easy thing to recreate at bars and pochas and also just like at home so I think it was something that kind of like went a little bit like viral on like social media still is and it's also just that perfect like sweetness and cheesiness that um the korean palette today is like really into you can add a little bit of spice with like gochugaru gochujang

33:45Nick Dodge:and yeah it's just really fun i love it it's a great pairing too with barbecue it feels like it works really well with like a kalbi sweetness of kalbi exactly spicy exactly dishes as well

33:56Irene Yoo:yeah so in my book i made it like a corn cheese queso so i leaned more heavily into the cheese I wanted it to be a little bit more like queso and chips. So really good with beer. Always good with soju.

34:08Nick Dodge:Well, I want to talk about Orion Bar. Tell me all about it and what it's like running a bar in the summer of 2026 in New York. It's been a crazy couple weeks, a couple months, really.

34:20Irene Yoo:Yeah, we just celebrated two years of Orion Bar. It has been a crazy time to own a bar for many wonderful and less wonderful reasons. I really wanted to open this bar with my partner because I love Korean-style drinking. Obviously, I wrote a whole book on it. But I did not want to always be going to Manhattan K-Town to find it or to Korea. so I wanted like open a bar in Brooklyn where I could get soju but I could also get delicious cocktails get some natty wine get some beers get some food so we really wanted it to be like a neighborhood bar so we're still like really growing in that neighborhood because we're out in Bushwick and it's been really exciting lately because like we just had like the Knicks win and that's been like so fun to like gather the community it's currently world cup and like tonight is the um third korea match and so it's been so amazing to like gather the community um and just see all the koreans come out of the woodwork tool like where's the korean bar let me go find it um so that's something i definitely want to do more of like looking into like year three is i want to do more like community events for koreans i really want to keep like scratching that itch and creating and connecting people in doing all these sort of like unique events that maybe you can't find like elsewhere.

35:47Nick Dodge:What's the menu looking like? The food menu? Like, are you offering cheesy queso, obviously, cheesy corn queso? And are you like, are there many of the recipes from the book on your bar menu?

36:00Irene Yoo:Yeah, I developed the recipes for the book and the bar at the same time. So when we opened, they were straight out of the book. I've since evolved them. A large part of it is because at the bar we have a deep fryer and I absolutely love deep frying. So there are things on the menu now like we have a fried cheese curds that's like battered in some makgeolli and fry batter. And then that's served with like a nori, like a kim sour cream. That's really good. We have some like gochujang marinated like fried ribs. One of the recipes I developed for the book that evolved into a different one for the bar is in the book, it's a Korean fried chicken.

36:44Irene Yoo:It's like a chimek chicken. It's a little bit the cross between that like soy sauce, garlic chicken and the spicy one because I like kind of want it to always be in the middle.

36:53Nick Dodge:I love that. So I agree fully. I think you need to have that like middle zone. Yeah. It's just like can be a little bit too much spice. Exactly. Or just like too savory. Or too savory or just like not enough spice.

37:03Irene Yoo:Yeah. And I want it to just be like perfectly in between. I want to be a little bit spicy, a little bit sweet, a little bit savory. So I developed the sauce that was kind of in between. And that's actually at the bar. We do it on deep fried tofu. We call it Dubu Nuggets. And that's been crushing it ever since we introduced it.

37:20Nick Dodge:Dubu Nuggets. Yo, that's cool. I like that a lot. Yes. What's it like running the bar? I mean, is it challenging? I feel like restaurant owners, bar owners in New York, it's like one of the most difficult jobs right now.

37:32Irene Yoo:Yeah, it's really tough because like for me, it's my first foray into owning a restaurant. It's something like Nick's been doing his whole life. So I think there are things that are really like surprising to me. Like staffing is always hard. And also just like predicting like customer patterns is really difficult. And just like managing the day to day.

38:00Nick Dodge:Yeah.

38:00Irene Yoo:And but like I think it has been really one thing that I anticipated that didn't like happen is I think I anticipated having to like educate people more on this is what soju is. This is what Korean food is, whatever. And I haven't had to do that at all. I think a lot of people come in with so much more knowledge than I expected and people are so excited to try like our version of it. So I'm so excited to have seen the evolution from like the pop ups and showing people this is different types of Korean food to people just coming in being like, I get it. I understand it. I love it. So I think otherwise it's just like maintaining and growing and just like, you know, it's just it's still just a job.

38:39Irene Yoo:Yeah, it's a job.

38:40Nick Dodge:It's hard. But there's also a lot of rewarding elements having community to come together. Exactly. Having a place to celebrate Korean culture in Brooklyn. I mean, Brooklyn, 15 years ago, had very few Korean restaurants. and now there's more and you're one of them. It's very exciting. You're three. I mean, congrats. That's like crazy. Thank you. Hard to do that. Late night bites with friends? Already hard to beat. That first too hot bite of fries you couldn't wait for, followed by ice cold Pepsi. Now that hits different. Suddenly, the energy kicks back in. The night goes longer and the laughs don't stop because Pepsi brings out more flavor, more fun, and more of the moment.

39:20Nick Dodge:Food deserves Pepsi. Grab a Pepsi Zero Sugar today. Plan B is a backup birth control option that's there for you when things don't go according to plan. It specifically works after unprotected sex and before pregnancy occurs by temporarily delaying ovulation. Plan B is available nationwide at all major retailers and through delivery apps like DoorDash. No ID, prescription, or age requirement. It's the number one OBGYN recommended brand of emergency contraception, and it won't impact your future fertility. That's freedom to be. Use as directed. Let's talk about the next morning. You have some specific hangover recipes, recommendations, or even not the next morning.

40:02Nick Dodge:It could start at the end of the night. What's your take on that?

40:06Irene Yoo:Hangover, for me, hangovers are crucial to completing the drinking cycle. You cannot not feed your hangover, and that's also something that's so important in Korean culture. They have a whole industry around it. Hangover cures, hangover drinks, hangover soups, obviously. So if you're in Korea or you have access to Korean food, then you absolutely just have to go to get hangover soup, which is usually some like spicy chock full of veggies, meat, broth. It's going to make you just sweat, but it's also going to like replenish your vitamins and your minerals. And that part is scientifically proven.

40:43Nick Dodge:Yeah.

40:44Irene Yoo:So not all of the hangover cures are like scientifically proven, but obviously just having some good food and nourishing yourself and replenishing hydration is so key. But for me, I think like you can just do it at home, get some like instant ramen because that's easy. Yeah. Put in. I always have like a bag of soybean sprouts because it's also really good for hangovers. And then just like whatever else I have in my fridge, like Napa cabbage is great. Spam is great for flavor.

41:15Nick Dodge:What's the broth like?

41:16Irene Yoo:The broth. So I use those like bagged bone broth. That is really good. Now you can just get them really easily at like H-Mart. And so if I use that as a base or just like whatever chicken broth I have knocking around. Just anything to fortify the ramen is just something that you're just infusing more like flavor and nourishment into yourself.

41:39Nick Dodge:And a couple Advil maybe.

41:40Irene Yoo:Oh, yeah. You got to have that Advil. You got to have the Alka-Seltzer. I do like the Advil, Aka Seltzer, and Emergency Combo. And then if I have Pokari Sweat, then that is my Quad Fecta.

41:53Nick Dodge:Pokari, Japanese product, but...

41:55Irene Yoo:Very famous in Korea.

41:56Nick Dodge:Very famous, kind of the God-level Gatorade-ish product. Everyone knows Pokari right now.

42:03Irene Yoo:It's like salty.

42:04Nick Dodge:It's like salty. It's confusing, but it's okay. Yeah, it's like electrolytes.

42:07Irene Yoo:Exactly.

42:07Nick Dodge:Yeah, everyone knows Pokari.

42:08Irene Yoo:It's like salty Gatorade.

42:09Nick Dodge:I love it. Oh, man. Irina, this is Taste We Asked Guest About The Discerning Taste. So to close this interview, here's a little rapid fire fast and furious taste check. Are you ready?

42:17Irene Yoo:Yes.

42:18Nick Dodge:The best fruit.

42:20Irene Yoo:I would have said Korean pear, but it's too expensive. So I would say watermelon.

42:24Nick Dodge:Love that. Worst vegetable? Beets. Yeah.

42:27Irene Yoo:Yeah. They're just too earthy.

42:29Nick Dodge:You're not seeing it on the Korean menus. Exactly.

42:31Irene Yoo:Koreans are not beet people.

42:32Nick Dodge:Nah. Thank God. I agree with you. It's a bad one. What is your typical breakfast?

42:37Irene Yoo:I love a hungry man breakfast.

42:40Nick Dodge:Explain.

42:40Irene Yoo:Oh, just like, you know, you go to the diner and you get like the flat jacks. You get like the pancakes. You get the eggs. You have to get sausage. You have to get bacon.

42:49Nick Dodge:The hungry man, right? Yes. Or the hungry farmer. Yeah.

42:52Irene Yoo:Or like the lumberjack special.

42:54Nick Dodge:The lumberjack. Whatever it is.

42:55Irene Yoo:It's like the IHOP, like just give me everything you have in the back.

42:58Nick Dodge:Super good. Oh, it's so good. The best dessert?

43:02Irene Yoo:I love a key lime pie. Yeah. It's my Midwest showing.

43:05Nick Dodge:Yeah, right. Because Detroit.

43:07Irene Yoo:Exactly. Right.

43:07Nick Dodge:I'm Michigander as well. So shout out. What part of Detroit did you grow up in?

43:11Irene Yoo:I was born in Detroit proper. Yeah, yeah. But Nick's whole family is all, originally from Grosse Pointe, also lives in Detroit proper now.

43:18Nick Dodge:Oh, right on. Michiganders in the house. I like it. A restaurant you wish you could bring back from the dead?

43:23Irene Yoo:King Noodle. King Noodle was a big inspiration for the food that I make now. Like the kimchi carbonara that I have on our menu is very much inspired by theirs. They were like the first place I ever saw do it. And just that like that combo of like we're drinking, we're having fun. It's crazy. We're making stoner food. I was like that just blew my mind that someone could do that.

43:45Nick Dodge:What a blast from the past. I remember writing about King Noodle a couple of times. Really Bushwick as well. Yeah. Yeah. Very interesting.

43:51Irene Yoo:Very close to where we are.

43:52Nick Dodge:Yeah, exactly. And doing like fusion and doing kind of like that like superiority burger before superiority in some ways like big personality.

44:01Irene Yoo:Yeah. It was very like a few food.

44:04Nick Dodge:A little bit.

44:04Irene Yoo:Which I loved.

44:05Nick Dodge:I love it.

44:05Irene Yoo:It was very just like, we're doing what you want, take it or leave it. And I think it was just like that Bush, that like 2016 Bushwick energy.

44:12Nick Dodge:Totally. Yeah. Very, very good call. I love that memory. When you're craving fast food, where are you going?

44:19Irene Yoo:I would normally say Del Taco in LA, but I can't get that here. So then I would say Taco Bell. Of course. Which I just like read this thing about people being like, you know you're a foodie if your go-to fast food is Taco Bell.

44:32Nick Dodge:Listen, I totally agree. Tastemakers Taco Bell Put them together

44:37Irene Yoo:They have excellent Food scientists They do

44:39Nick Dodge:They have great products They have great innovation Yes This show is not sponsored By Taco Bell That could change But it should be It should be A few more Your favorite city outside America to visit for food

44:49Irene Yoo:Seoul of course

44:50Nick Dodge:Of course Do you go often?

44:52Irene Yoo:I do I go probably like Once a year Amazing

44:55Nick Dodge:Yeah When's your next trip?

44:56Irene Yoo:I just got back Oh cool I went in May So I'm always open To any opportunities Yeah To go but I'll probably go again next March.

45:05Nick Dodge:Oh, very cool. We got to trade some restaurants. I know. Got to talk.

45:09Irene Yoo:Your book is a great resource.

45:10Nick Dodge:Thank you so much. Last one, your favorite sandwich.

45:16Irene Yoo:A patty melt. I love a late night patty melt. We have one on Orion Bar. It's my favorite.

45:21Nick Dodge:Love that, Irene. I really enjoyed this conversation. Thank you so much for joining This Is Taste.

45:25Irene Yoo:Thank you so much.

45:31Nick Dodge:This is Taste is hosted and produced by Eliza Abarbanal and me, Matt Rodbar. The show is edited by lead producer Clayton Gumbert and supervised by Pat Stango, director of media production and development at Penguin Random House. Thanks to Shalia Harris and the production team at Penguin Random House. Theme music by Steve Rydell. Episode portraits by Louise Zergon Pomeroy. logo designed by Ellie Skrzat and Ian Dingham. Visit Taste Online at tastecooking.com and make sure to subscribe to our newsletter to keep updated on all cool things in the world of taste.