Neng Myun

Today was the first official day of summer break in London schools, which may be shocking to Vancouverites, since Vancouver students and teachers have been already been on vacation for three weeks, but at least Bob won't have to complain about teaching in July anymore! We decided to start the holiday with a visit to the Courtauld, which I visited for the first time when Bob was still in Vancouver recently.

This 1874 Renoir, La Loge, was Samuel Courtauld's most expensive purchase, made in 1925.
I liked this Camille Pissaro work, Lordship Lane Station, Dulwich (1871),
and The Toll-Gate (c. 1890) by Henri Rousseau:
The rooms in the Courtauld are also lovely, as this ceiling of Apollo and the signs of the zodiac demonstrates.
It wouldn't be the beginning of a holiday without some sort of celebratory meal, and we had exactly the same thing in mind--a trip south to New Malden, for a Korean lunch at the restaurant that had made us so happy at dinner back in March:
Although today was quite a cool day, we were both craving chilled Korean noodles, something that Korean restaurants only serve during the summer, as advertised on this hanging sign in the restaurant:
On many autumn, winter, and spring days in Vancouver, Bob's craved neng myun and found it very exasperating that it's not served year-round in Korean restaurants. He's even stubbornly gone into restaurants and asked if they serve neng myun, while I stand on the February street, shouting, "They won't have it!" and sure enough, he emerges from the restaurant, disappointed. In spite of the cool day, the calendar does say that it's summer, so Bob wasn't disappointed today. Although we both ordered chilled noodles, we each have our favourite. Mine is mool neng myun, chilled noodles in a cold beef broth with vinegar, mustard, radish, cucumber, beef, and egg:
Bob loves bi bim neng myun, which replaces the broth of mool neng myun with a super-spicy red pepper paste sauce (which is way too spicy for me). He loves his neng myun so much that he started eating before I could take this photo. "Messy!" he said after I showed him the photo:
Every time we order one mool and one bi bim neng myun, no matter how clear we make it that Bob is having the bi bim and I'm having the mool, servers in every restaurant always seem to put the bowl of flaming red sauce in front of me and the non-spicy bowl in front of Bob. When we switch them around, we usually get a surprised exclamation and look of apology. Sometimes in the tiny family restaurants, the proprietor will even check up on Bob to make sure he hasn't been killed by the spiciness, and will give him a look of supreme admiration when he survives, or even asks for more of the spicy sauce. Sometimes I don't know how he does it--one mouthful of bi bim neng myun would do me in for sure!