Sweet?

I don’t know when I’ll stop getting surprised by things I eat in Korea. Probably never. But it got me thinking about the differences between what Americans consider “sweet” food, versus Korea’s “sweet” food.

In some things, the differences are kind of drastic. Koreans like to fill pastries and the like with a sweet red bean paste. It looks a little like chocolate, so it can surprise you. One of the first things I ate in Korea was a croissant with red bean paste inside. It took me a while to figure it out. Though I don’t really mind it, I find most of the bean paste fillings sweet but plain. Give me chocolate any day.

I was told that Koreans think of tomatoes as fruit. Before you email me to say “They are fruit,” I know. We learned that in fifth grade. Regardless, Americans don’t treat tomatoes like fruits. In our minds, the fruit thing is a technicality based on seed placement rather than flavor. However, when kids have a birthday at our school, most parents give them oranges and cherry tomatoes. We also get cakes from Paris Baguette, and if you buy a vanilla cake, they put fruit on top. Cherry tomatoes are included. I couldn’t help but wonder how Koreans feel about pizza or pasta. Do they find the tomato sauce really unappetizing and weird? That might explain why so many pizzas I’ve eaten are lower on sauce.

Those are two relatively big differences, but I also found that Koreans have pretty intense sweet teeth (that doesn’t sound right). The cakes I mentioned always have sugary frosting. I can’t eat them at all. You know the frosting on pre-made cakes that seems like it’s just made of sugar and food dye? It looks a little like toothpaste and gives people headaches? Korean frosting has more. It’s similar in consistency to a cream frosting, but somehow the people who made it managed to add more sugar.

Also, sweets abound everywhere. I know most of my impressions are influenced by the fact that I’m teaching small children, but there’s a whole lot of candy out there. Most of said candy tends toward the fruit flavors and hard candies rather than chocolate or caramel. Heck, I’ve even found the fruit juices really sugary. Granted, I used to drink cranberry juice, so maybe I’m not the best judge…

You also find sugar on or in surprising things. One of my first weeks here, I bought garlic chips (like in Gardettos). I was wholly unprepared for the sugar on top. Not having much of a sweet tooth (particularly when mixed with garlic), I swore I’d never buy chips again. About a week ago, I made the same mistake. Sure, after tasting the sugary garlic chips, I remembered my earlier experience, but what does that matter? For some reason, chips and crackers sometimes have sugar. I’m not wild about chips in the first place, so I’ve been avoiding them (not to be unadventurous but I’m not a fan of the seafood flavored chips, anyway). Apparently the result of that is a bad memory for what is sweet and what is not.

Okay, I’d better stop. I’m getting hungry, and pretty soon I’ll work up some enthusiasm for the garlic chips. I don’t want to make that mistake thrice.