Grandmom's 88th!

We visited my grandma to celebrate her 88th birthday. Whoa man, 88 is pretty damn old! A variety of korean foods in fancy aluminum pans. I forget where my mom picked this food up from, but it was actually pretty damn good. Later that night, we trekked to my aunt's house for some more food. She had these freakishly ginormous shrimp. She didn't realize that she didn't have any normal tempura batter, so she ended up having to use this spicy chicken batter. These were so big she could only fry up a few at a time. There's my hand for scale. They really were pretty much as big as my hand. I don't have the biggest hands, but they're quite normal sized. These shrimp were huge. The chicken batter ended up being fine. It's hard to screw up fat giant shrimp being fried in a hot vat of grease. We would be terrible koreans if we didn't bbq some meat. We would have grilled outside but it was storming something terrible, so we had to resort to using an indoor grill. In addition to meat and shrimp, we also had some spicy fish soup.

Momiji Sushi, Eh

On a recent trip to Toronto, I was staying in some outlying suburbs. Whenever I'm somewhere new, I like to consult my trusty friend, yelp. It has treated me very well when travelling to new places. I wanted some japanese food, so that led me to Momiji, in Etobicoke. Try saying that 5 times.
It's located in a cute little downtown strip type of area. The place is rather unassuming and dark and dank looking from the outside, but the inside is lovely. It's modern, yet comfortable. Swanky, but not snooty. I really liked the decor. They even had some odd christmas lights hanging down from the ceiling. Rather out of place, but I liked it. And amongst the swank, an oddly placed flatscreen tv, where they played football, soccer, and cage fighting. It was amusing.
I started off with some agedashi tofu. I love me some agedashi tofu. This portion was ginormous. It was practically an entree. There was a giant heap of nori and bonito shavings on top. And a teeny tiny bowl of dipping sauce. Most times when I get agedashi tofu, it gets served within the sauce. So a separate dipping bowl was a first for me. It was ok. My favorite agedashi tofu still remains at Sagami. But this dish was ginormous and quite a bargain. The server even offered to bring me another tiny bowl of the dipping sauce. I appreciated that, as there clearly wasn't enough.
It is a sushi joint, so I had to at least try something. So I got a spicy california handroll. Man, was this good. I couldn't quite figure out what made it spicy. I was thinking it was the sauce, but it also seemed like that perhaps there were super thin slices of jalapeno or something else spicy in there too. Whatever it was though, it was good eatin.
I was super hungry, so I got a bowl of the nabe yaki udon. It came in this lovely earthenware bowl with a bunch of seafood and chicken breast and a bunch of veggies and egg. The broth itself was a little bland, but I still enjoyed it. The chicken breast was suprisingly good and grilled. Aside from some dark mushrooms, there wasn't even anything else offensive in this. It was a nice bowl of udon.

This was a great meal. I would highly recommend it to anyone in the western Toronto burbs looking for some good japanese food. And it was also affordable. It was reasonably priced, even in canadian dollars, so you know it's even better in US dollars.

The service was also good. It took awhile for my server to come over initially, but after that, it was smooth sailing from there. This place is also run by koreans. You remember me saying this before. There's probably a 50/50 chance that a sushi place is run by koreans. I think what gave it away was the k-pop playing on the stereo along with bulgogi and "spicy seafood noodle soup" being on the menu.

Oh, and the other thing that gave it away. The majority of the servers were male, all dressed in black, and tall, slim, and attractive, and all looked like they were part of a k-pop boy band. Seriously. They all had extremely trendy and stylish hair (for korean hair) and were extremely well groomed and polite. The styling gel use ratio of these boys was 100%, that's for damn sure. Later in the evening, when most of the guests had left, the servers all started gathering around. And in my head, they busted into a well-choreographed dance routine and started lip-synching to some good bubblegum k-pop. Like this.

Seriously folks, it was uncanny. Can you imagine getting served sushi by these guys? Maybe they ARE part of the next up and coming k-pop act, and they all happen to work at a sushi restaurant as their day jobs. Because really, I can't imagine every day regular folk looking like this on a regular basis.

But yes, back to my point... the food and service here are good! Give these boys some love and help them pay for their guyliner!

Agape Sweets

While I was at Assi's food court, I picked up a few sweets at Agape Bakery. Mainly, I was there to pick up a mocha cake for the dinner party. After I paid, the lady gave me a couple of pastries for free. I was too stuffed to eat it that night, but it made a great snack the next day.
I love these types of cakes that the korean bakeries make. They're super light. This particular one is a mocha cake. Unbeknownst to me, the cake came with candles and a plastic cake knife! Surprise! When we ate it at the dinner party, we lit the candles in preparation for R's birthday coming in the next few weeks.

Agape Bakery

1222 Welsh Rd # B10

North Wales, PA 19454-2059

(215) 412-0478

Assi Food Court

It got pretty cold in the middle of the week, so I got in the mood for hot noodle soup. Particularly hot and spicy soup. So I dragged H/A to Assi's food court to get me some korean noodles. There's a variety of korean food to choose from, as well as a bit of japanese.

H/A got some kitsune udon. He said that ever since we went Mitsuwa and I got the kitsune udon there, he'd been wanting to get some for himself. The portion sizes at the japanese spot at Assi is nice and big.

H/A likes to order two entrees. He just does. So he also got a bulgogi platter. It came with a giant plate of rice, and some banchan. The kimchi was ok, the radish kimchi was weird, and the black bean dish was too salty, not enough sweet. The soup was good too.

I wanted my hot korean noodle fix, so I got a nice big bowl of jjamppong. It's a dish that originated in china, but it's been quite koreanized. It's one of my favorite korean dishes of all time. This wasn't the greatest jjamppong around, but it really hit the spot. The noodles are usually thick and hand pulled, but these were just some boring thick spaghetti type noodles. There certainly could have been more seafood in it. Not exactly what I wanted, but you know, sometimes, you take what you can get. I still enjoyed it! It looks like a big bowl of red death, but it's not too spicy. Spicy, but not too much so.

Assi Plaza Food Court

1222 Welsh Rd

North Wales, PA 19454

(215) 631-9400

Tampopo

The plan was to have lunch at Kong, but Kong is not yet open for lunch. So our plans were dashed. H/A and I had been talking about getting ramen, and didn't really know a good place to get it, so we thought we'd give Tampopo a shot. I had also gotten my haircut a day earlier, and my stylist is adorable and japanese. I had asked her about ramen in philly and she said there is no good spot for it. Things were looking ominous.

There are three Tampopo locations, and we went to the one in west philly because it's the only one open on sundays. It's actually quite a cute spot. It's also the newest one. You order your food, get a buzzer, and pick it up when it's ready. There's plenty of dining space and cute little stools. They serve mostly japanese food and some korean dishes as well. I have a feeling they're run by koreans.The day actually turned out to be super hot, so I wasn't in the mood for ramen anymore. But H/A and D both got the tampopo ramen. There is no choice, just one ramen dish. It has pork and chicken broth, chashu(braised pork), bok choy, fish cake, egg, and scallions. And the broth is shockingly super hot and spicy. It's fine at first, and then it totally hits you. I liked it! It's unlike any ramen you've had before, but because it was so different, I have to give it props. D thought the noodles were too doughy. H/A wolfed it down like he hadn't eaten in days. Seriously, he ate the whole entire pile of noodles in one spoonful, it seemed.
J got the yakisoba and the miso soup. The yakisoba portion is a bit on the small side, especially for dudes, so beware. He got it with chicken, and he liked it very much. H/A also got yakisoba (yes, he was eating multiple meals) and he also liked it. The miso is just fine.
Since I wasn't feeling the hot food, I wanted something cold. So I picked the fresh tuna bibimbap. Mine came with brown rice, raw tuna, avocado, Korean pear, cucumber, lettuce, and red and white cabbage in a slightly spicy/sesame oil dressing/sauce. Everything in this dish was raw, except for the rice, which was obviously cooked.Here's the slop after you mix up all the goodies. I loved this! The flavor of this dish is quintessentially korean. But it's something that everyone could like. You can get it without the raw tuna, so for those of you wary of raw fish, you can still enjoy this. It's fresh, crunchy, and quite healthy. The texture is amazing. And the tuna is a nice touch. Others enjoyed this dish as well. I think the portion of rice was a bit on the paltry side, but otherwise, a perfect dish. I'll definitely be back to Tampopo.

Fort Lee Late Lunch - Picnic

Driving back home was just about the worst thing ever. I was starving, I had to pee, and we were stuck before the GW for about two hours. It's just horrific when cars are not moving, there's nothing you can do about it, and you're physically uncomfortable. Ugh. But as soon as we got over the bridge, it was just fine. And we stopped at Fort Lee so I could cram food into my gullet. A had told us to stop in Fort Lee at this little takeout spot. She raved about it. She didn't know what it was called, but it was on Main Street and right across from Parisienne bakery. After a few hiccups, we eventually found it. It's called Picnic. It's mainly a takeout spot, but there are a couple of tables and some counter space. It's korean, chinese, and japanese bento type fare. There's tons to choose from. There are a variety of different bento boxes that you can customize. Tons of sushi and rolls and such, as well as some korean dishes. My mom went with the spicy stir fried squid bento box. It also came with tangsuyuk (korean sweet and sour pork), seaweed salad, a bit of pickled radish, and of course, rice. Now normally, this stir fried squid dish is one of my most favorite of all korean dishes, but here, not so much. They put perilla leaves in it. And perilla leaves are just one of those things that I cannot stand. At all. It's like how my mom hates cilantro. So it absolutely ruined this dish. Perilla leaves aren't something that is normally used in this dish, so it puzzled me so as to why they would ruin this perfectly fine dish. Boo to picnic for taking something great and bastardizing it to nastiness. A had mentioned that the dukpoki was very good here. It's one of my favorite korean dishes, so I had to get it. It turned out to be only ok. In fact, A has made me dukpoki before, and hers is far superior to this one. She should go into business and hawk her dukpoki! I would totally buy it. The picnic one I can take it or leave it. I mean since I was starving, I wolfed it down, but otherwise, I would not have really bothered. It was just missing something. All in all, this place did the job of filling our bellies, but neither of us was very impressed. I've had much better korean elsewhere.

Picnic
239 Main St
Fort Lee, NJ 07024
(201) 363-188

The Great Korean Grocery Store War

We wanted to catch the taiko show, but had a bunch of time to kill, so we decided to explore some more of this part of new jersey. It's chock full of asian neighborhoods. We wanted to go to an H Mart, and googled for one in Fort Lee. Then we got there, and it wasn't even in existence yet. FAIL. One of the only times google has ever failed me. Don't think I won't remember this google!
Luckily, we found another one, an open one, nearby in Ridgefield. This one was a Super H Mart. What makes it so super? Well, it was pretty damn big. And it had more little shops in it than any other asian market I'd ever been too. It almost seemed like a little korean mall was attached to it. And man, did they give out free samples! It was awesome! Because it was such a huge store, there were tons of samples being given out. They usually do that at the one by me, but my H Mart is so small that if there are samples, it's one or two things. Let's just say that we got quite full with samples!The crazy thing was that on our way to this Super H Mart, we passed by the grand opening of H&Y Marketplace. I didn't know what this was, but after a quick google, I found out it was another korean supermarket! Practically next to the H Mart. Seriously, it's like 100 yards away. They could share parking lots if they really tried.
I can't say that I have a preference, but the H&Y was much more attractively decorated on the inside. As if they were catering to a slightly more sophisticated crowd, more of a whole foods crowd, while stocking the same exact food as H Mart. It's smaller though, and the aisles seem quite narrow. They had tons of free samples as well. I loved them both!

Beans For Dessert!

So it's summertime in Philadelphia, and while it hasn't been excruciatingly hot lately, it's been hella warm. And humid. Perfect for a cool treat. So while dropping by Assi with some friends the other week, I picked up a box of these popsicles. BBBig! Yeah, that's right. And it's a popsicle made from sweet red beans.

Crazy, right? Well, actually, not so much. In the lands where people who look like me come from, sweet red beans are quite often used in desserts. Sweets, pastries, candies, and ice creams! The idea of a red bean popsicle is not strange to me, but I grew up with it. But I can see how you may find it offensive. But you have to remember that this is sweet red bean, and not a plain bean. This is not refried beans on a stick. It's sweet and delicious. Now there are actualy hunks of beans in there, so that part actually is a bit strange. But I guess it's not really too much stranger than eating a fruitsicle where you bite into hunks of strawberries or mangos. But yeah, the whole hunks of beans is slightly offputting, but trust me, it's good.

Tofu Cabin

After wandering about san mateo county, we met up with A and E to have some suburban korean fare. In a very unassuming stripmall in San Mateo, we went to the Myung Dong Tofu Cabin. A and E get take out from there regularly, and they know one of the ladies who works there, who totally takes care of them.
It's a low key spot. Not particularly attractive. They do have pits in the tables so you can cook your own meat. We didn't cook any of our own meat this time.
Our beautiful array of banchan. Starting from 12 o'clock: kimchi (meh), mystery vegetable (good), seaweed salad (good), bean salad (good, but the biggest beans I've ever seen used in this dish), radish kimchi (awesome), fish cake salad (good), and japchae in the middle (ok, it was too much noodles, not enough anything else).
So the place calls itself tofu cabin so I guess they specialize in soondubu. E was the only one who actually got one, and he got the mushroom one. Why does soondubu always look like a cauldron of hot firey death? It was good! And everybody got a bowl of red rice, or purple rice, or whatever you want to call it.
A got the dolsot bibimbap. Around my parts, it's usually not served with a raw egg on top, but here it was. Here's a funny thing. They don't serve bibimbap here and give you a little bowl of kochujang. They have bottles of kochujang on the table. So A never knew that she was supposed to (if she wanted to) put kochujang in this when she mixes it all up. She ate it plain, and I also tasted it plain, and it still tasted great.
J got some kalbi. And while he liked it, it solidified to him that he's just not into ribs. He doesn't get the hype. It's too much work and too much fat for him. Good to know for the future.
I got the yukaejang, which was a special for the night. It also always looks like hot firey death. Man, this was particularly spicy. It's supposed to be spicy, and it was shockingly spicy. But I managed. It tasted great, but for me, it needed more substance. There wasn't enough of the shredded beef or other stuff in it. It left me hanging for more!The dish of the evening was the spicy rice cake with beef, or bulgogi dukbokkum. Ok, so let me just say, that in all my years of eating korean food, I've never had this dish before. Never. Never at home or in someone else's home, nor in a restaurant. I remember awhile back, A had come to Philly and she mentioned wanted a spicy rice cake dish. So we went and got dukpoki. While she liked it, it wasn't what she wanted. THIS was what she wanted! And no wonder I couldnt get it for her, I didn't know it existed! It basically consists of the sliced rice cake and bulgogi, in a sweet and somewhat spicy sauce. But the sauce is not at all like the dukpoki sauce. And hence, the confusion between the dishes. Everybody loved this. I loved this. I want to be able to get this at home now! Damn it! Someone, please help me find this!

Service was ok. You know how I feel about service at korean restaurants... don't expect much. But because the one lady knows A and E, she took really good care of us. She even refilled a bunch of our banchan dishes. I'll go back just for the rice cake dish alone! But all in all, a solid korean meal.

Korean Fast Food

We spent some time walking down Market street and hanging around the Powell st bart stop doing a little window shopping. After being quite worn down, I remembered that there was a Beard Papa's at the big shopping center. And so we headed down to the food court so I could grab myself a couple of beautiful cream puffs. Did you think I wouldn't hit up Beard Papa's while in California? Pish! They're in the white bag on the tray!!! Then we started walking around this really nice food court. We got suckered in by free samples from Sorabol in the food court. It's a korean fast food place.

This plate is ginormous. Like seriously ginormous. More than enough for two people. I can't imagine one human being eating this much food, unless there was a cash prize at the end. We got the two meat combo, which was kalbi stew and grilled chicken, and it also came with a giant heap of white rice, an even bigger heap of japchae, and then a bit of broccoli and onion as veg. And then the piece de resistance! Kimchi! And it was good kimchi at that. I loved it! And the rest of the plate as well. I can hardly tell you just how much meat was on this plate. Seriously, like 3 chicken breast size portions of chicken, and a dozen pieces of the rib. Gah. And we ate it all up. I wish I could eat like this at my local mall.

Gaya - Fancy Korean

My bro and his wife were down for the holiday weekend which meant korean food time. Whether it is mom's cooking or going out, it's always good to get a hit of korean food every once in awhile. After a lunch at the H Mart food court and an afternoon of rambling about town, we decided to hit up a new spot for dinner. We went to Gaya, which is a korean restaurant / banquet place in the burbs. It's kinda fancy and all, which means expensive. We saw at least one wedding banquet going on while we were here. There's actually also a japanese place here. So it's a korean restaurant, japanese restaurant, banquet spot trifecta.
Some of the random banchan and other condiments and stuff we got with our meal. An array of lettuces and blanched cabbage and raw veggies (had never seen the raw carrots and cucumber that was included before in any other korean restaurant before). The bowl with the clearish liquid and radish? I have no idea what the name of this is, but it's incredibly refreshing in the heat. Zesty too.

Their banchan was nothing special, except for the dish all the way in the front. It looks like a weird red mess, but it's actually raw blue crab marinated in a red pepper sauce. I know the concept is wackadoo, but this is one of my favorite korean dishes, ever. And I totally ate this up. I made my mom ask for a refill. It's just awesome. Yes, the crab is raw, but this doesn't phase me at all. It's just the greatest thing ever. But as my mom said, this has to be beyond fresh. So I'm hoping these buggers were alive on the morning I ate this.

We got the seafood pancake, and it was pretty darn good here. Thick, but not too thick, and well cooked.

We also got the ojingaboekum, the stir fried squid. And get this, at Gaya, they serve it with a heap of udon noodles. Freakin brilliant I say. Everyone should do this. Their squid was on point. I'm a big fan.

We also got a bunch of meat and cooked it at the table. All the tables have their own little cooking pit here. I think it's a gas grill system but there's real wood so it gets all charcoaly and stuff. The ventilation must be good because we didn't come out of there stinking of bbq. Perhaps that's why it's so pricey? I totally forgot to take pictures of the actual meat. Duh. We got the house galbi, which ended up being kinda bland. I mean it was excellent quality meat, so it was as if we were eating steak, but there wasn't enough flavor. So it was like eating korean bbq, but not.

Service was good though, and it better well have been because it's not cheap. i mean korean food in general is not cheap. It's one of the more expensive asian foods out there. Is it worth the extra $$? Eh, not sure. It was good enough, but maybe not quite worth it. It wasn't extraordinary or anything. But if I have to go to a wedding banquet, I surely wouldn't mind. I'll just make sure that I'll be able to get some of that crab!

Birthday Korean Dinner

Even though it was for my birthday, I let my mom pick where we should go. So we ended up going to Nagwon Garden, one of our local faves. We're pretty boring when we go eat korean food. We don't usually order anything wacky or experiment. We stick to what we know, what we like, and what's good.
None of the banchan was particularly outstanding, but they were all pretty good.
We ordered the haemulpajeon (seafood pancake). I've always liked it here. It's not too thick, everything is cooked all the way through, and it's chock full of seafood, including squid, which is my favorite part.
My mom went with dolsot bibimbap, one of her ol standbys. I had a little bit of it, and it was pretty good, as usual. I love the burnt rice bits on the bottom.
As for me, I wanted something super hot since it was bitterly cold, so I went with jjamppong, a spicy seafood noodle dish. It's one of my absolutely favorite dishes in the world. It's full of seafood, veggies, and thick wheat based noodles in a spicy broth. This particular one wasn't nearly as spicy as it looked. Jjamppong is actually considered a Korean Chinese dish, but whatever it's considered, I dig it.

Service was on par with other korean restaurants, meaning ok. On this particularl night, we were the only people dining in the place. It was a bit weird. But I blamed it on people being glued to their seats awaiting the Lost season premiere or just staying indoors and keeping warm. I did see some takeout orders going out.

Nagwon Garden
7650 W Chester Pike
Upper Darby, PA 19082
(610) 449-1800

Not Very Traditional Thanksgiving

My family doesn't really do much for thanksgiving. It's never been a big holiday for us, and we've never really gotten together with extended family for it. At least not for at least 15 years. This year wasn't much different. Just my moms, bro, and sis-in-law eating well, let's face it, a very schizophrenic thanksgiving dinner.
I told you we didn't go traditional, but we had to have turkey. I really do like turkey a lot, so this had to be included. And heck, let's throw in a ham while we're at it.
In addition to other non-traditional random foods, we had kalbi and some of these shrimps that my mom had marinated with lemon and lime juice, tons of garlic, and some parsley. The only annoying thing was that she left all the shells on. Totally wished she would have peeled em. There was tons of other food too, including some delish spring rolls, but more on them later. It was so much food that when I saw the table, my immediate reaction was "who's gonna eat all this food?" But I guess that's what thanksgiving is all about.

Korean BBQ, Not All You Can Eat

LA is home to an impressive koreatown. It's sizeable and has tons of places to eat, of the korean variety, and otherwise. It also has multiple all you can eat korean bbq joints. I've never been to one, and I didn't want to pop that cherry on this trip. So instead, we went to a slightly fancier korean spot for bbq and other food - Soowon Galbi Korean BBQ. We went simple and ordered the galbi. We only ordered one portion, so we did not get to grill it ourselves. They only let you grill at the table with two or more portions. We didn't mind, because we were starving and didn't feel like waiting any longer than necessary. Unlike any place I'd ever been, we were given somes salad, and the above accoutrements for the meat. Some dipping sauces, thinly sliced pickled daikon, and rice cake wrappers. I've been eating korean food and korean bbq my entire life, and I've never seen these accessories before. Is this a west coast thing? Something new I haven't been made privvy to? Their selectin of banchan was pretty standard. They're so anal, they have to line up the banchan dishes just right. I liked their kimchi, it was fresh and light, not very fermented, the way I like it.We also ordered haemul pajeon to have a little something else to eat. This was unlike any haemul pajeon I've ever eaten. It was super duper thick, like a deep dish pizza. And the thing was so hot and steamy. I typically like it more thin and crispy, but it was still good like this. But really, I prefer the pancake thinner.And finally, the meat! It was pretty yummy. Good quality meat, nicely flavored, not super sweet. It's a bit pricey, but still a good portion. The service was really good. The dude that was our waiter was super polite and seemed to be fresh off the boat. It's a bit nicer than most bbq joints, so if you don't want to scare first timers, this would be a good spot.

Soowon Galbi Korean BBQ
856 S Vermont Ave
Los Angeles, CA 90005
(213) 365-9292