Korean cuisine is quite different from the cuisine of both China and Japan. A typical Korean meal consists of rice and a variety of pickled vegetable side dishes. Korean food is often hot and spicey as much of it is flavoured with red pepper paste.
There has been some international controversy about Korean cuisine over the fact that a few dishes consist dog meat. During the 1988 Summer Olympic Games at Seoul, the South Korean government asked its citizens not to consume dog meat to avoid bad publicity during the game. The controversy surfaced again in 2001 when the organizer of the World Cup Soccer games demanded the Korean government to address the issue. Many people have argued that the only difference between slaughtering a dog for food and slaughtering a cow or a pig is the culture in which it is done.
Famous Korean dishes:
- Kimchi - cabbage pickled in Chili pepper sauce.
- Korean BBQ - meat grilled over fire. Korean BBQ sauces are spicy hot but rather sweet.