Beautiful Tea Museum 아름다운 차박물관 Traditional Tea House

Insadong is always crowded with tourists looking for traditional Korean crafts, museums, restaurants and tea houses. I went to Insadong with a friend and decided to do tea, Korean style. The place that we visited is called 아름다운 차박물관 which means Beautiful Tea Museum. It's not really a museum but they do have a section in the front entrance that showcase some of the traditional potteries and tea cups.
This is the picture of the front entrance and as you can see, there is a small showcase area for potteries.

This is the outside seating area and it's very airy and peaceful. The aroma of various teas fill the room and you can't help but feel calm and peaceful as you enter into this space.I ordered 유자차 yujacha or citron tea (7000Won). I felt like I was coming down with a cold so decided to get this Vitamin C rich tea. But they have pages and pages of teas in their menu and you might feel a little overwhelmed by it. For young people, they also offer ice coffee, ice tea and desserts like crepes and waffles. Next time, I think I would try their shave ice.
Me, posing with my tea. They also bring out a pot of hot water so you can refill your tea cup. I think I refilled it like 5 times until I couldn't taste the tea anymore.

Saboten- Tonkatsu Shinjuku Style~

This is the best tonkatsu restaurant in Korea! With no exaggeration, this place is THE place for tonkatsu. I've been to Japan about 7 or 8 times and this place has the closest resemblance to the tonkatsu that I had in Japan in its taste, texture, and atmosphere. I went with my Japanese friend and even he said this place was pretty close to tonkatsu back at home. For more information on this place, you can visit their website at www.saboten.co.kr
As you can see from the sign, Saboten is a chain-ten or franchise from Shinjuku, Japan. There are 37 stores in Seoul alone where many of them are in department stores like Hyundai, Lotte, and Shinsegae. This one is in Myeong-dong and it's always crowded.
I ordered Saboten 정식 (teishoku) for 14,000Won and it came with 안심 fillet , 등심 roast, & 새우 shrimp. It was just perfectly karikari and sakusaku (means crispy in Japanese)! The only thing that I was slightly disappointed about was the rice. Rice in Japan is so much more tastier and shinier. Too bad they didn't use Japanese kome (rice). I also ordered a draft and they only had Hite. It would've made my night if they had Kirin Ichiban Shibori or Asahi Super Dry on tap. Hite isn't bad but it's nothing compared to Kirin or Asahi... nomitaina~
A close-up of my last piece of shrimp tempura. Yum~ it was perfectly crispy and tender. I wanna go back for more~~~