We had completely run out of udon and soba, not a tenable state of affairs for our kitchen. We decided to make a run down to 99 Ranch Market in Edmonds to restock our Asian food pantry, and as long as we were down there, go out for Korean BBQ. We enlisted a pair of friends to help us out with dinner, which turned out to be a very good thing.

We went to Ka Won, a place I picked more or less at random but which was supposed to have good banchan. It was a great night to sit at one of the barbecue tables, as it was clammy and cold outside and the warmth from the grill was very welcome. With the waitress’ assistance, we ordered a barbecue set meal with black pig, beef rib and squid, plus an order of fatty brisket with mushrooms. We sat and drank warm tea and cold beer for a little while, then the food began to arrive.

The set meal came with a hot bowl of tofu-bean paste soup and a puffy egg custard that was delicious. The banchan included two kinds of bean sprout salad, cabbage kimchi, cucumber kimchi, fried anchovies, greens with sesame, frittata, agar, potato salad, something that might have been fish cake, and a big green salad. Plus rice. The waitress loaded the grill for us, then after leaving us to it for a while, came back and exasperatedly grilled more of our meat for us – apparently we were being inefficient about it. We managed to eat nearly everything on the table, though.

It was a little hard to face the drive home.