Flavor Boulevard

Tag: banchan

  • The unpredictable Myung Dong


      Unpredictability #1: “Are you opened today?”
      Before you set your GPS to Myung Dong in Houston, make sure you call and ask that question in the clearest, simplest way possible. Aaron tried different versions, most were a bit too elaborately polite with a perfect American accent, and only succeeded in confusing the poor old man. I tried it once and got the answer “Yes, open.” We hopped en route.


      (If you don’t call, there’s a slim chance that your schedule will coincide with the owner couple’s schedule, which depends on the lady’s health, and she’s the only chef. That slim chance didn’t happen for me the first time I set out for Myung Dong.) The limited English conversation is nothing uncommon at Korean and Vietnamese mom-and-pop diners, but I have to mention it because it’s one of those things that make me classify Myung Dong as more “authentic” than the other Korean restaurants in Houston. The second thing is that its name doesn’t contain “Seoul” or “Korean”, they go more local: Myungdong (명동) is a part of Seoul (in Vietnam, its equivalent would be a phường). The third thing is that its name contains its specialty: kalguksu (칼국수). In fact, that’s the only part of the name still visible on the sign, the Myungdong part has faded completely, which explains why we couldn’t find it the first time (aside from the other fact that we couldn’t read Korean at the time)*.

      Of course we ordered it. It was the first kalguksu I’ve ever had. It’s a handmade, knife-cut noodle in soup, and this version has only noodle, broth, and vegetables. The broth was sweet and deep, the noodles were wonderfully chewy. But kalguksu is like fireworks, the first two minutes are great, then you ask yourself “just when is it gonna end?”. Now that I’ve had kalguksu, unless I get a two-minute-size bowl, I doubt I will gather enough curiosity for a second kalguksu in my life**.

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    • Korea Garden on Long Point Road


        We were looking for a get-together location on New Year’s Eve, when we decided that since both of our families like Korean food, it’d be good to let Ms Baker try it for the first time too. Houston’s West side houses many a place for a good bulgogi, concentrating on the section of Long Point that’s sandwiched between Gessner and Blalock, but we set our mind on Korea Garden. Half of us had been here several times, and we didn’t want any adventure on Ms Baker’s first impression, she’s a conservative. 🙂


        It turned out her very first impression was curiosity: how did they manage to section 7 equal slices of the haemul pajeon (해물 바전)? It was a good jeon, however lay on the soggy side if compared to pancakes at Secret Garden and Casserole House. The banchan selection included some of our favorites: potato, seaweed, and sliced eomuk (어묵), although none appealed to the Americans at the table. The kimchis had quite a bit of chili, though.


        So did the dak bokgeum (닭 볶 음 stir-fried chicken) that my dad fell for. That sneaky heat wouldn’t hit you right away.  Only half way through the heap of bird and veggie did he  turn to my mom and me with a tilted smile and a slight head shake: too spicy.

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      • Casserole House – Jeongol in Oakland


          If you’ve had Vietnamese hot pot and liked it, you’d like the Korean hot pot better. If you haven’t had Vietnamese hot pot, try it, and then try jeongol (전골 Korean hot pot), and then you’d like jeongol better. There goes my motherland loyalty, but Vietnam has bánh cuốn and gỏi cuốn, so I’m not too worried.

          Lots of beef, lots of mushroom, green onion, bean sprout, tofu, cucumber, cabbage all snuggling in a pasty sunny broth. The pot is more like a deep tray on a gas stove, and the bubbling conglomeration is like a spoiled teenager threatening to run away from home. The bulgogi junggol comes to us wild and daring. We ladle right in.


          Casserole House has these big bright pictures on the wall of beef, spam, vegetables, and seafood neatly arranged in a round dish or bobbing in broth. The real stuff in action also hides some tteokbokki (떡) for chew and dangmyeon (당면) for engtanglement with the enokitake that just wait to drip the broth between the plates or fling a fortunate dot onto your shirt. I don’t know why they would call jeongol “casserole”, the word brings to mind a square glass dish with crispy-top green beans swearing hot from the oven, which, as yummy as it is at Thanksgiving, is far less exciting than a hot pot. (As a guy said in a Super Bowl ad, “it’s where the action is”.)

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        • Sura in Oakland – A banchan chapter


            The one thing you can be certain about when you go to Korean restaurants, regardless of their size and price and menu, is that you will always get full. I’ve never been to a Korean restaurant where I think “hmm, maybe I have room for some more” when I leave. Korean restaurants always give you big portions, and on top of that, there is the banchan (반찬).  When you sit down all starving because of the steaming broth or the grilled meat smoke from nearby tables, the banchan is the first thing to nibble on and ebb the hunger. You can either get a lot of coleslaw and dongchimi (동치미, pickled white radish in this case), or an array of little bitty plates that look too colorfully appetizing to disturb. Naturally, the size of your bill corresponds to the variety you can sample. And the biggest sample of banchan I’ve had so far is at Sura.


            Here’s what to prepare your tummy for when you’re at Sura: 1 starter, 18 side dishes,  whatever you actually order (which comes with either brown rice or white rice), 1 dessert. If you order gogi gui (고기구 이barbecue), then you also get a heap of lettuce to wrap. If that’s not enough, you can ask for more side dishes. So let us begin.


            Starter: gaeran jim (계란찜 steamed egg) in a dolsot (돌솥), still bubbly when brought out. It’s really mild, bland even, with dots of green onions and an airy texture.

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          • The Korean Secret Garden in Santa Clara – Bi Won Restaurant


              It’s late April and the wind still blows cold. The tiny coffee plant I got last winter is still grudgingly hiding in my room for warmth, while I desperately crave a big hot soup with kimchi. Since coffee leaves wouldn’t make either great broth or pickle, we set out to Sunnyvale.

              But driving in Sunnyvale on an empty stomach is no fun. The signs and loops are out to get you, and your tummy makes you rush running around. It was supposed to take less than thirty minutes, yet we’ve been driving for over an hour. After lots of wrong turns and backtracking eastward and westward, we thought we wouldn’t make it before closing time. Then as Hope faints, we see it. Secret Garden timidly stands at the end of a strip mall’s parking lot.


              The restaurant may not have a snazzy outlook, but its spacious interior is quite nice. I’m a fan of booth seating and its privacy, but it’s a luxury in Berkeley. Here, the mahogany tables and thick cushion benches fit snuggly in enclosing of wooden planks, so that conversations can be spilled out somewhat comfortably and elbows do not touch. But the loveliness of food on neighboring diners’ plates is still in sight. It’s torturous to look at others eating merrily while you’re hungry, you know. Thank goodness the banchan is served quickly. Within minutes after placing our orders, plates after plates come out that I barely have enough time to snap a picture of them all. As light shines directly onto the crisp white melamine, the color contrast is so brilliant I suddenly don’t want to disturb any plate with my clumsy chopsticks.

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            • Another lovely meal at Berkel Berkel


                In Vietnam, the first month-old birthday of a baby marks an important celebration. So today is the day, Flavor Boulevard is a month old! Considering FB‘s birth month is also the month of passion and chilly winter, what’s better than a hot plate of “Omu-rice – Perfect for sharing between a couple in love,” said the menu at our local Korean fave on Telegraph Avenue?

                So I ate it, and here I share it with my FB. Fried rice with ham, green beans, and peas wouldn’t normally rank high on my list, but the saucy, creamy running egg yolk does wonders. The omelet tasted unseasoned, but its natural plainness was a great base for the rice. Given the fact that I always prefer my French fries sans ketchup, I didn’t find ketchup a well-matched condiment here, perhaps something more buttery would be nice. But perhaps a sour brush was a healthy contrast. Omu-rice is lovely still.


                As usual, Berkel Berkel has unlimited spicy kimchi, nonspicy pickled cucumber, and sweet black beans to accompany your main course. Firm and nutty, the black beans (kongjaban) are a pleasant delectable if eaten individually. Of course it’s not easy to eat one by one with chopsticks, but it may be well worth the effort: black bean sweetened with honey and soy sauce “is good for your head,” so I was told by the kind-hearted host of Berkel Berkel. I’ll sure take any chance I get to be smarter, so I ate a bunch of these.

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              • Korean Garden Grille

                  Korean movie series are my soju. It’s for celebration, depression, even seeking motivation. I got motivated to learn Korean and to try Korean food. I made a couple of attempts in College Station, but it’s not a good idea to judge Korean cuisine from a local Chinese restaurant. The urge to understand why their food looks so appealing in movies overtook the resistance against chili pepper. So we went to Bellaire the first weekend I got home, to a Korean buffet.

                  Korean Garden Grille has a spacious feel (again, something of Texas that I will miss). I made a point to sample everything, and I almost accomplished my goal. I tried “beef seaweed soup” (no beef was visible, so I assume it was beef flavored seaweed soup?), 11 kinds of kimchi (not knowing most of the Korean names nor the veggie names), bulgogi, japchae (stirfried cellophane noodle), 7 kinds of fried egg/veggie (again, not knowing either the Korean names or the veggie names). The kimchi was mostly sour (a little more sour than pickled daikon and carrots, not as salty as pickles, much less aggressive on the back of the throat than the French pickled cornichon).


                  Above image: From left to right, first row: napa cabbage (wombok/baechu/cải bách thảo), don’t-know, don’t-know radish, bean sprouts; second row: not-sure seaweed, daikon-maybe? kohlrabi, no-idea. I tried a couple of angry-looking-red-peppered kimchi the angry-looking red-peppered odeng (first thing in the image below), but they weren’t too spicy (well, at least not in small quantities), the fried octopus (red, bottom right) was quite tongue-catching actually.

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