Gourmet Korean Restaurant, Kingsford

This is the first Korean Restaurant we came to 3 years ago.

and surprisingly, we’ve only been here twice and not for the past 2 years.

but a few days ago, i got a craving for it. I think because it is getting cold. and it seems like we’ve found an old favourite. i hope we will be back soon again!

It’s a very quaint and homely restaurant. Their tables are all for 6 and are these huge shiny wooden tables. i quite like it. It’s upstairs, in Kingsford, but quite far away from the other restaurants. i don’t even remember how we chanced upon it. I think it was on a bus on the way to Eastgardens.

Their dishes are all in sets which only a few side dishes.

It doesn’t look like a lot. but it is quite filling.

I ordered a Japchae Gourmet Tofu Set and Fish ordered a Teriyaki Chicken Set.

We also ordered a side dish of seafood pancake.

My set came with:

  
Rice – cooked in a stone pot. I really quite like the idea of this. It makes it feel all the more authentic.

 
My Japchae – the version here is very different and it is here where i ate my first plate of Japchae. Here, it is much soupier whereas others are more like fried noodles. I like this, but it was a tad salty.

and a small pot of Gourmet Tofu. Spicy broth with soft tofu and an egg and seaweed on top. Very nice on a cold night.

Fish was the same, except he ordered Chicken Teriyaki.

He wasn’t a big fan of this. but he really loved the Tofu hotpot.

So, the next time, they actually have their Tofu hotpots as main dishes instead. They have it with all sorts of ingredients, like Beef Tofu Hotpot, which i’m quite sure that will be what Fish will be getting. Mushroom Tofu hotpot etc etc..

 
We also ordered a plate of seafood pancake. It was huge. but it was good. I had to pack some home. The seafood i find, is better than the one @ Seoul Ria. Their squid is much softer and tender as compared to Seoul Ria and i find myself chomping it all down, although i don’t eat squid. It also has a lot of veggies that Seoul Ria doesn’t.

 
It has onions, capsicums and carrots.

Side dishes! are of course important in a Korean meal. We had 5 side dishes. Kimchi, Sesame oil Beansprouts, spicy picked something, spicy fishcake and a coleslaw of sorts. Everything was delicious, but these were our favourites:

 
This is my favourite. It’s like coleslaw and it’s crunchy. It has carrots obviously, but i’m not sure what the other ingredient is. Our first thoughts were Japchae noodles. which i think it is.

 
Fried fishcake with a spicy sauce – should be made spicy using green chillis. This is quite nice. I really like it and i’ve never eaten this from any other Korean restaurants.

and this is fish’s fav. Beansprouts in sesame oil. I don’t like it obviously. but he does.

and you can get refills of your side dishes as long as everyone eating ordered their own dishes. so if you and your friend are sharing a dish, you can’t get refills.

we got refills for the coleslaw like thing and fish wanted more beansprouts, but they were out of that.

 
We sat diagonally opposite the cashier, which also has this display cabin, which is where they take the side dishes and bring it to you.

Their chopsticks and spoon have a paper covering over them. which i quite like. somehow gives me a sense of cleanliness.

I like it here. it’s nice and quiet, the waiters are not very fluent in English but they’re very polite and unassuming at all. A bell rings in the kitchen to signal that there’s food to be collected and a waiter goes running over, placing all the food in a trolley and rolling it over to the table. It is all stone pots etc, so it is very hot, using the trolley was a great idea.

I hope we go back soon!