Foo(d) Bar Blog - Korean

Anyone Have Good Restaurant Recommendations for Seoul, South Korea

Sun, 27 Jan 2008 22:14:00 -0400

I'm in Seoul all week for work, and I was wondering if anyone had recommendations for restaurants worth trying out? Getting around the city isn't a problem, but I would like to find places for dinner that are within the metro area. I'm open to most any cuisine, although I'm really hoping to find a restaurant that does a good job with Korean royal court cuisine without costing a ridiculous amount of money. I'm also interested in traditional Korean restaurants that serve a wide variety of banchan (side dishes). Any suggestions are welcome!

Go Mo's Owners Open New Restaurant: The Manna Cafe

Thu, 14 Jun 2007 16:28:00 -0400

The owners of the now defunct Go Mo's Korean restaurant have opened up a new Korean BBQ and Boba Tea shop called The Manna Cafe over in Gilbert. The old Go Mo's was hit or miss, so it remains to be seen how the new establishment fares. The Manna Cafe
721 N. Arizona Ave.
Gilbert, AZ 85233
480-545-6677

Island Roots Guam Cuisine - Tempe, Arizona

Wed, 28 Mar 2007 17:29:00 -0400

Driving down Elliot Road the other day, Pere and I noticed that Sonoma Chicken Roasters had gone out of business and been replaced by a Guamanian restaurant called Island Roots Guam Cuisine. I made a mental note, and decided to give the place a visit soon. Soon came sooner rather than later. Today, Moody and I headed there for lunch. The interior hadn't changed much from when the place was the Sonoma Chicken Roasters. It had the same bright, clean interior with lots and lots of space, the only real change being the addition of island memorabilia adorning the walls and counter. We were promptly greeted at the door and seated at a table right in between two other tables of diners. This seemed a little odd given that the place is huge and was otherwise empty. Before we had even sat down, our waiter asked if he could bring us anything to drink. Not having had a chance to look the menu over, we both ordered waters. I think it's hard to say that Guamanian cuisine has a distinct identity of it's own. Given it's location (lying in the Pacific between Japan/Korea, Hawaii, and the Philippines), it borrows heavily from those countries as well as Spain and Mexico. The menu at Island Roots reflects this with dishes like lumpia, pancit, and adobo (Filipino); kalbi and bulgogi (Korean); and Spam musubi from Hawaii. Before we had a chance to look the menu fully over, our waiter returned with our waters and asked if we were ready to order. A few minutes more, and we were. We started things off with an oder of the lumpia. They came out piping hot and were well fried. The sauce was tangy sweet and offered a nice balance to the meat and veggie filling. For entrees, Moody went with the chicken adobo while I had the Portuguese sausage with fried eggs. Moody's adobo was authentic Filipino and contained several pieces of chicken thigh and leg still on the bone, with skin as well as two scoops of red rice. When Moody asked the waiter what red rice was, his reply was that it was just more flavorful. I think it would have helped if he had mentioned that it was colored with annatto. Moody said the adobo was very good, although there was a fairly high ratio of scraps to meat. The Portuguese sausage plate I had was really tasty. The sausage was nicely grilled, and went perfectly with my over-medium eggs. The annatto in the rice gave it a nice orange color (more so than red), and the rice had good flavor, although I wasn't able to determine where it came from (perhaps bacon?) as annatto is relatively flavorless. Next time, I'd like to try out the Spam musubi. I also hear they have Poke on the weekend, a Hawaiian favorite of mine that I'd like to try their rendition of. Overall, the meal was decent, and I would definitely recommend Island Roots - especially to Filipinos who find the options for authentic Filipino dishes in the valley to be lacking. I would, however, like to see Island Roots work on their service. I know it's a family run business, but there's just no excuse for lax and uninformed service these days. Given the large size of the restaurant, and the relatively emptiness of the place during the lunch rush, I have to wonder how long they'll be able to stay in business. If Island Roots is going to survive, they are going to have to polish things up a bit.

Chodang (Cho Dang) Tofu & Korean BBQ - Chandler, Arizona

Wed, 20 Sep 2006 16:30:00 -0400

Where I work, we maintain a long list of local lunch spots we regularly eat at, as well as a list of places we've never been but want to try. We make it a point to try at least one new spot a week. A few weeks ago, Moody and I attempted to try out a new Korean restaurant in downtown Chandler called Chodang, but unfortunately, they were closed at the time (it was a Tuesday). It wasn't until the other day that we finally got another chance to give them a try. From the outside, the restaurant didn't look like anything special. Many of the restaurants on Arizona Avenue in Chandler are housed in buildings that have been there for quite a while, and many of them are a bit rundown, so I wasn't setting my expectations very high. Imagine my surprise when we stepped off the street in Arizona and into what can only be described (by Moody) as the most authentic looking Korean restaurant he's seen in Arizona. The place was extremely clean, well lit, and pleasantly decorated with hardwood floors and partially wood paneled walls. Tasteful pictures and paintings of Korea hung on the walls. Each table was outfitted with a call buzzer, another touch popular in Korea. Ringing the buzzer activates an LED panel behind the service area, alerting the wait staff that you require attention. Moody gave it a try, and sure enough, about 30 seconds later, our waiter appeared. Our meals started out with small salads, which were fairly plain and dressed with a sweet, soy based dressing. Shortly after, we placed our orders. While we waited for our entrees, the waiter showed up with a tray full of side dishes (banchan). My favorite thing about Korean food isn't the entrees; it's the side dishes that typically accompany them. In almost every Korean restaurant I've been to, you get between five and six small dishes of various types of kimchees and other items to go with your meal. The side dishes at Chodang were excellent - I really could have made a meal from them alone. Both Moody and I opted for tofu soups. I ordered the beef version. Korean soups are served boiling (literally) hot, and this one was no exception. When the waiter served the soups, he asked us if wanted egg. Most Korean restaurants add the egg to the soup automatically, so I thought it was a nice touch that Chodang offered the option, especially since I wasn't in the mood for the egg anyhow. The soup itself was very flavorful and contained a healthy amount of beef and a ton of tofu. There was certainly no skimping on quantity. Chodang's beef tofu soup was easily the best I've had. Of all the Korean restaurant's that I've eaten at in the valley (Hodori, Takamatsu, GoMo, Korean BBQ), I'd have to say that Chodang is my new favorite. The combination of interior aesthetic, tasty food and good service place them a notch above their competition.

Korean BBQ - Mesa, Arizona

Thu, 17 Nov 2005 13:55:00 -0400

A few weeks ago, Pere and I had tickets to see the Shanghai acrobats perform at the new Mesa Arts Center in downtown Mesa. If you've never been to the Arts Center, you owe it to yourself to check it out - even if you aren't catching a performance there. It is absolutely the finest building (architecturally) in Mesa, and one of the finest in all of Arizona. It also happens to be the largest arts center in the state. Since Pere was coming from North Scottsdale and I from Chandler, we decided to meet for dinner somewhere in Mesa before the show. If you've never been to Mesa before, it isn't exactly a mecca for fine dining. In fact, once you rule out corporate chains, it gets difficult to find much else. One place I have been meaning to try, though, is a place called Korean BBQ on Alma School and Guadalupe. I hadn't had Korean in a while, and with the weather getting cooler at night, I'd been in the mood for the type of comfort food that Korean dining provides. We ended up meeting around 6:15 or so and had the place virtually to ourselves for half of the meal. The restaurant is tucked away in the corner of a strip mall, but that shouldn't surprise anyone given that's standard for most Arizona restaurants. The interior decor is sparse, but tasteful. One thing I like about Korean BBQ is that they have the tables with the built in grills for grilling your own meat. I'd say the Korean restaurants in Arizona are split about 50/50 on places that do vs. places that don't. Since this was Pere's first experience with a Korean restaurant (we've cooked a few Korean dishes at home), I thought she should have the full effect. We started off by ordering OB (Oriental Brewery), an import from Korea. Made with rice, it's essentially Korea's answer to Budweiser. It tasted very similar. Very light and easy to drink, but essentially flavorless. Since it was also happy hour while we were there, our waitress informed us that our beers came with free sake (presumably for sake bombers). The sake was unremarkable. We didn't bomb them this time around and instead sipped them throughout our meal. After looking over the menu, we decided to split three dishes. I knew it was probably going to be too much food, but I wanted variety! We ordered Bul Gogi (thinly sliced marinated sirloin), Bibim Bap (stone bowl filled with rice, beef, vegetables, seaweed and a fried egg) , and Haemul Pajun (rice flour pancake with spring onions and seafood). The first item to arrive at our table was the Bul Gogi. Our waitress placed all of the meat on the grill at once. The result was that all of the meat was done at the same time. I would have preferred to grill the meat in smaller batches so that we didn't end up with a big pile of meat that was mostly cold by the time we got to it. Grilling preference aside, the meat was nicely marinated and very tender and juicy when grilled. Wrapped in lettuce and Next up was the Bibim Bap, a stone bowl beautifully presented with rice, beef, jullianed veggies, seaweed, and a fried egg. The funny thing about Bibim Bap is that in order to eat it, you basically take all of the arranged items in the bowl, add a bunch of sauce, and mix it all together. The end result is quite tasty, especially the crispy bits of rice scraped up from the bottom of the bowl. Our third dish was the Haemul Pajun. When the waitress put it down on the table, I knew right away that there was no way we were going to finish all of the food we ordered. The Haemul Pajun was the size of a medium pizza. It was topped with spring onions and stuffed with squid and octopus. Overall, the pancake was really good. The seafood inside was a little on the chewy side, but the overall flavor, when accented with the dipping sauce our waitress provided was quite tasty. We finished as much as we could and asked the waitress to box up the rest. Unfortunately, we were too full for desert. This has always been the case for me when I've had Korean food. There's just so much that's available as part of the meal, I've never managed to save enough room for desert. All in all, our meal at Korean BBQ was good. I still need more experience with Korean food outside of Arizona before I can really say what's really good and what's not outside of the limited experiences I've had so far.

Go Mo's Korean Restaurant - Chandler, Arizona

Wed, 31 Aug 2005 15:47:00 -0400

Update: Looks like GoMo's is no longer in business. Moody, Adam and I headed over to a relatively new Korean restaurant in town for lunch this afternoon. Moody had eaten there before and said the food was pretty good. Moody has visited Korea several times, so I tend to trust his judgement on Korean food. Adam's been there once as well, but he wasn't as adventurous then as he is now. Adam ordered the Yuk Gyae Jang, a beef brisket soup with green onions. Moody and I both had the Kimchi Tofu Soup with Beef. I asked for mine extra spicy. While we waited for our food, the waiter brought out a simple lettuce, cabbage and carrot salad with a sweet dressing for us to share. It was simple, but it tasted good. Besides, I was starving. Just as we finished the salad, the waiter came back with a tray of six or seven ban chan (Korean side dishes). There was kimchi, small anchovies, pickled radish, and a few others that I didn't recognize. They were all good, but the anchovies were my favorite. I was really hoping for bean paste of some sort, but there wasn't any to be had today. Go Mo's makes different side dishes every day, so you never know what they are going to bring you. As we nibbled on our side dishes, a contingent of Koreans from my office came in. We're a Korean founded company, with a lot of Korean expats working in the office. When they give a restaurant their business, it's usually a good sign. When our meals finally arrived, my soup was boiling (literally) in the bowl. It had a really good aroma and was nice and spicy - just the way I like it. My only real complaint here was that they use soft tofu in the soup. This made it really hard to tell the tofu from the egg they put into the soup. I'm not a fan of soft tofu in general, so I would have much rather had firm tofu. The one thing that was absent from Go Mo's was the table top grills common in most Korean restaurants. I'm not sure why Go Mo's opted not to install them, but I think they add a sense of adventure and fun to restaurant dining that's missing from Go Mo's. The next time we come here for lunch, I'll probably try one of the bulgogi (BBQ) dishes.