Fine dining has taken a step beyond a mix of good ingredients and meticulous presentation to include the setting as well. Sheraton Seoul D Cube City Hotel presents luxury dining at the hotel’s presidential suite. Overlooking the nightscape of Seoul, the 265-square-meter presidential suite on the 39th floor offers an exceptional dining experience. The hotel offers an eight-course menu prepared by Paul Dodd, the new executive sous chef in charge of Western cuisine at the hotel, targeting couples p

 Taste of Europe at Sheraton Grande WalkerhillSheraton Grande Walkerhill is offering the Taste of Europe promotion featuring a special eight-course menu at its European-style restaurant and bar CLOCK16 from Nov. 1 to Jan. 31. The menu includes an array of authentic European cuisine by world-renowned chefs. Dishes in the menu include salad with cod fish, chickpea soup with grilled prawns, seafood baked in parchment paper, cannelloni stuffed with beef cheek, balsamic vinegar sorbet, charcoal-grill

Doenjang (fermented soybean paste) is a staple Korean condiment that’s used, among other things, as a base for stew or soup. Its deep, rich flavor is created by several months of fermentation and aging. Doenjang jjigae is a stew, which typically includes meat, tofu and various vegetables. It is one of the most representative dishes of everyday home-cooked Korean meals. Korean home cooks usually save the water used to rinse rice, ssalddeummul, and use it for a stew or soup. The rice water adds st

Heads-up, Pyongyang: Lingerie is headed your way.The North Korean capital on Thursday was selected by popular online demand as a target for a Swedish clothing brand’s campaign to “love-bomb” places with 450 pairs of underwear.Bjorn Borg recently held “Bjorn Borg Says JA! to Weapons of Mass Seduction,” event that had people from around the world nominating locations that need “love and seduction,” on which the company will drop its products.Pyongyang came in first with 27,162 votes, while Chalmer

Diagnosis of chronic bronchitis is based on the criteria of coughing and sputum production for more than three months in a year for two consecutive years. Smokers who frequently have phlegm are included in these criteria. Smoking is the most common cause of chronic bronchitis, but environmental pollution is another important cause, particularly due to worsening pollution. The increasing number of chronic bronchitis patients each year is thought to be also related to stress. Other contributing fa

New director Lee outlines vision for major expansion combining technology, personalized care, international service

Fashion designers find modernity in the silhouette of the traditional Korean men’s garment

Critical MassBy Sara Paretsky (Putnam)There must be something inspiring about dating a classical musician: Since private investigator V.I. Warshawski took up with double bassist Jake Thibaut in 2009’s “Hardball,” her creator, author Sara Paretsky, seems to have renewed creative energy, evident in pages that almost seem to turn themselves.The considerable action of “Critical Mass” (the title refers to nuclear physics, not getting together a crowd of reviewers) is set off when Warshawski is asked

Lowcountry BombshellBy Susan M. Boyer (Henery Press) Eccentric characters go together in Southern mysteries like, well, shrimp and grits. But Susan M. Boyer deftly shapes characters with just enough idiosyncrasies without succumbing to cliches in her engaging second novel.“Lowcountry Bombshell” surprises at every twist as Boyer infuses her lighthearted plot with a look at obsession with celebrity, unadulterated greed and an affectionate look at South Carolina.Private detective Liz Talbot pretty

Richard Kadrey’s new novel, “Dead Set,” gave me nightmares. And I can’t stop myself from telling him ― even though the bestselling horror author dresses in black, has intimidating tattoos and the watchful bearing of an assassin. He’s reluctant to take off his dark glasses.“Cool,” he says, stirring his coffee in the dim daytime light of a Los Angeles bar. “It’s an experiment.” “Dead Set” (Harper Voyager) is far less violent than the bestselling Sandman Slim series he’s known for: “There’s fewer b

When readers follow Bill Bryson on a literary amble, they never know exactly where they might end up ― just that they’ll probably be happy to have tagged along.His past journeys, along the Appalachian Trail (1998’s “A Walk in the Woods”), into the life of Shakespeare (2007’s “Shakespeare: The World as Stage”) and the rest of the universe (2003’s “A Short History of Nearly Everything”), to name a few, put him in rarified territory. He’s popular enough to automatically appear on best-seller lists,

Pianist Lee Ko-eun was named one of three top winners at the 2013 Concert Artists Guild Victor Elmaleh Competition and the recipient of the Victor & Sono Elmaleh Piano Prize, the CAG announced Thursday. The Concert Artists Guild Victor Elmaleh Competition is an annual event open to instrumentalists, singers and chamber ensembles performing classical and non-traditional repertoire. The other two winners this year are the Donald Sinta Quartet and violinist Alexi Kenney.Lee, who also won several ot

Seoul Zoo has ended all its animal events after retiring a California sea lion, Bangwuli, from presentation to visitors ― the last animal show it ran.The zoo said Thursday that it closed the Bangwuli presentation late last month to treat the male sea lion because he looked distracted and had difficulty digesting fodder.The Bangwuli show was the last animal event at the zoo after it released Jedori, a Indo-Pacific bottlenose dolphin, into the sea off Jejudo Island on July 18. Jedori had a stunt s