#KoreanCulture In a traditional Korean situation how would they celebrate a birthday. By eating seaweed soup of course (미역국)
미역국is a seaweed soup Koreans eat on their birthdays ; have you ever read a tweet by a Korean idol and wondered why he/she has said they are going to have “미역국” today? 🙂 its because its a traditional way of celebrating ones birthday in Korea. People can even great you on your birthday by asking if you have eaten your 미역국 hehe~
Though Koreans nowadays celebrate their birthdays in a Western-style with the cake and gifts and maybe a little get-together with friends/ and or family but they still have their traditions of eating/ drinking 미역국 (Seaweed Soup) on their birthdays too! which is so lovely sticking to tradition but still having some good ‘ole cake with friends and family ^^
Q&A Post Format 🙂
Q. When do Koreans eat 미역국 (seaweed soup)?
- on their birthdays as a celebration of the care given to them by their Mothers
- Postpartum because seaweed soup is high in calcium and iodine so its good for the baby and the Mother (before giving birth and after giving birth for quicker recovery)
Basically eating seaweed soup is associated with birth in some ways ; eating of the soup on your birthday and eating of the soup a few months/ or weeks before childbirth and a few weeks after childbirth. ^^
Q. When would Koreans not eat the seaweed soup?
I read in my textbook that Koreans would not eat 미역국 on an exam day because seaweed is slippery (I’ve never seen it before though ㅋㅊ) so the slipperiness of the soup would give the idea of failing the exam and so when they fail an exam they would naturally think and say “Ah! I had seaweed soup!” its a weird thing to think but it sort of rings a bell to me when I think if you fail an exam you have ‘slipped’ ㅋㅋ
#end
I found a recipe of 미역국 soup online (HERE) which looks less revolting (…sorry!) than the others I saw with the videos on YouTube, personally I would like to try this 미역국 if I am in Korea (yes. I am optimistic I will go in the near future ㅎㅎ) because it looks different to the food I have eaten, but, I don’t know if its to my taste it seems to have meat in it (Red Meat) and I hate red meat I can eat it but it makes me sick so if I could try one with just the seaweed and the other stuff minus the meat then I would like it. In the blog post I read it sounds like a “gooey” soup and I don’t like gooey food but if again…less gooey I would like it I think and the recipe on this blog has a less-gooey seaweed soup xD
Hope you enjoyed the post 🙂