Korea Samgyetang

Patrons exhausted from the heat, wanting to regain energy lost from the torrid weather, lining up outside this samgyetang (ginseng chicken stew) restaurant is a familiar sight every summer. It’s questionable whether a single hearty meal can do much for one’s energy, but if that meal is samgyetang—then, perhaps, that’s another story. Korea Samgyetang opened its doors in 1960 and continues to thrive today, as Korea’s first samgyetang restaurant. The meat of the seven-week old rooster (one raised for breeding) used is firm, with a pleasantly chewy texture, and the bird is stuffed with glutinous rice, four year-old Geumsan ginseng, dates from Gyeongsan and various traditional Korean medicinal ingredients. It’s all placed in an iron pot and simmered down. And once you consume the meat, chewy and yet soft enough for the bones to slip right out, accompanied by a bowl of the savory broth, you can almost hear all the organs in your body shout, “Ah, that’s refreshing, ah that’s warm!” At this point we can’t even call it food—this is a drug.