b.b.go

Can Center City sustain two fast food-style Korean restaurants within mere blocks of each other? Giwa, the hugely popular Korean joint that opened in 2006 on Sansom St., now has competition from the newly opened b.b.go on the corner of 18th and Ludlow. Or does it?

b.b.go dubbs itself as a "fusion rice bar, " and serves a limited menu of rice-based Korean dishes. Bibimbap and Dubbap are the two main offerings, with each dish having a handful of variations depending on desired ingredients — tofu, chicken, beef, pork, etc. Also on the menu are pajeon, japchae, dukbokgi, and gimbap.My main reason for visiting b.b.go was to eat gimbap, Korea's answer to sushi and an answer that I actually prefer to Japanese sushi, but have difficulty finding in Philly. b.b.go's menu lists beef or tuna gimbap, but I thought I'd ask if they had veggie gimbap. At noon, only an hour after opening and before any sort of lunch rush had started, b.b.go told me they had sold out of the two orders of veggie gimbap they had made (if I am to believe that they even made a veggie version), and, apparently, had no interest in making me any.
Unlike at Giwa where you can order bibimbap cold or in a hot stone pot, at b.b.go cold is your only option. Your choice of brown or white rice is topped with various vegetables in the case of the vegetable bibimbap or the tofu bibimbap, and a fried egg upon request.

Zuchinni, mung bean sprouts, carrots, lettuce, daikon, spinach, and silken tofu topped this bowl. With the exception of the pickled daikon, all of the vegetables were plain — but fresh! — and the tofu was unseasoned. I prefer more pickled and fermented vegetables on my bibimbap. Perhaps the heacho bibimbap with seasoned seaweeds would have suited me better.

Kochujang, a spicy pepper sauce, is squirted on top by the server only upon request, and if you want more, you'll need to get up from your table and squirt some more from the couple of kochujang bottles sitting on the ledge with the utensils and napkins.
The accompanying miso soup is mild and innocuous.The accompanying kimchee is spicy, but, as far as kimchee goes, this is mild stuff.Tofu dubbap with mushrooms, carrots, broccoli, and onions is nicely spiced (I asked for medium), but is also sweet and saucy. This is actually how I would like my cheap Chinese take-out to taste, but not my Korean food. The accompanying salad of iceberg and sliced radishes with Italian dressing was an unpleasant mystery.

b.b.go currently has an off-the-menu bento lunch deal that will get you most of the way around the small menu, and then you can decide for yourself which fast food Korean restaurant is tops — Giwa or b.b.go?

b.b.go
20 S. 18th St., Philadelphia, PA 19103
215-569-8600
Mon-Fri: 11am-9pm
Sat: noon-8pm
Sun: closed

Kahl-Bee

Kalbi or Kahl-Bee? The large sign and the menu say Kalbi, a traditional Korean grilled meat dish. The parking signs out front and most any info online about this Wilmington Korean restaurant in a strip mall on Kirkwood Highway say Kahl-Bee, the phonetic spelling of kalbi. I'm going with Kahl-Bee since this write up will be online with all the other Kahl-Bee's.

I've known about this Korean restaurant since the day I landed in Wilmington, but have never been until a few weeks ago when my friend Mike suggested we stop in for a lunch date. Why haven't I been until recently? Because they have a kick-ass little Korean grocery store two doors down that I stop in to pick up fresh kimchi and other fresh pickled veggies to make my own bibimbap, my favorite Korean dish, at home. I wrote about this sweet little shortcut a few years ago.

But now that I've visited Kahl-Bee, I can tell you that its a charming little no-frills, but clean, strip mall joint with tables equipped with grills for your Korean grilled meat pleasure. We skipped that fun; the both of us went all-veg.

Kahl-Bee's menu has a small vegetarian section that takes all the vegetarian items under other sections of the menu - appetizers, soups, noodles, etc. - and puts them in one place. So, if you're veg, just skip to the vegetarian section instead of trying to weed out the veg dishes hiding under various headings.
We started with a generously portioned appetizer of scallion pancake. Mike thought the pancakes were a little greasy and could have been a little spicier, and I'll agree that they were greasy, but such is a scallion pancake. The two of us only ate half of this dish, not because it wasn't good, but because we're limiting greasy food intake. I liked the long strips of scallions that really let me know there were scallions in there.
Most Korean restaurants set out dishes of banchan at the beginning of the meal before appetizers or entrees arrive, but at Kahl-Bee our very skimpy selection of five banchan arrived not before our appetizer or before our entrees, but with our entrees. This was just wrong. Hopefully, this was just a one-time fluke.

I talked Mike, a Korean food newbie, into ordering bibimbap, a bowl of rice topped with assorted veggies and a fried egg, and he thoroughly enjoyed it. Sorry, no picture.
In an attempt to get away from my old standbys - bibimbap, kimbap (not on Kahl-Bee's menu!) and jap chae - I ordered the tofu chigae, a soup of firm silken tofu, sweet and hot peppers, onions, and what seemed to be squash in a spicy broth. While I would welcome this bowl of soup any day, this dish just isn't for me. Neither was the soup at Pastoral, a Korean restaurant in Philly, I tried recently. It's not the soup's fault. I'm a carb-loader/lover. Give me rice and noodles.

With only ten vegetarian items on Kahl-Bee's menu, and only two of of those ten that I have not eaten at Kahl-Bee or some other Korean restaurant, I'll probably stick with the grocery store two doors down to concoct my favorites at home, but I'd certainly return to Kahl-Bee any time some friends fancy an outing for Korean food.

Kahl-Bee
2011 Kirkwood Hwy, Wilmington, DE 19808
302-998-4310
Mon.-Thurs., 11am-9pm; Fri.-Sat., 11am-9:30pm; Sun., closed

Pastoral

If it's not already obvious, I'm not Korean. I am far from an authority on Korean food, but I do like Korean food. My absolute favorite Korean meal consists of kimbap (a sushi-like roll) and bibimbap (a big bowl of rice topped with assorted veggies), and I order it all the time, which makes my authority on Korean food very, very limited. I recently decided I should order something else, to see if I could fall in love with other Korean dishes as much as I have with kimbap and bibimbap.

And here enters Pastoral, a Korean restaurant in Philly that's simple-Asian-sleek inside, and easy to tuck into without a reservation.

My partner notes that when he ate at Pastoral a few years ago, there were no vegetarian offerings on the menu, and had to request something be made vegetarian. So, it's important to note that Pastoral now has a vegetarian menu. The vegetarian menu is seperate from the regular menu, so be sure to ask for it if it's not stuck in the regular menu, as it was absent in one of our menus, but present in the other. (Update: maybe my dining partner just wasn't presented with the veggie menu many years ago.)
The server at Pastoral was keen enough to ask if fish was OK in our selection of banchan, and it was, so that's why you see a dish of fishcake in our otherwise vegetarian banchan. This appetizer sized dumpling soup has only a few dumplings and scallions, but plenty of extremely yummy, buttery broth that is perhaps a little heavy handed with black pepper, but I can take it. Lord knows what was in the dumplings; they were of little consequence, it's the broth that was amazing.
And here's my bowl of Soon Tofu, a dish I've never had before, so I have nothing to compare it with. The dish is described as a stew of vegetables cooked with soft bean curd in a spicy soup. I asked for the dish medium in spice level, and the dish was spicy enough, but I would go up a notch next time. The hot, spicy soup seemed perfect on such a cold wintry night, except the broth lacked depth (perhaps a non-veggie version would cure that), and I dislike silken tofu, which was a prominent ingredient in the soup.
This is my dining partners bowl of Yuk Gae Jang, a soup with scallions, mushrooms, veggies, and noodles in a spicy broth. This dish had a very similar broth as the Soon Tofu, but was slightly tastier, making Yuk Gae Jang my prefered soup of the two main dishes. The dumpling soup won hands-down, though.

Ah well, Soon Tofu and Yuk Gae Jang at Pastoral did not sway me from my favored kimbap and bibimbap, but that's not to say I wouldn't return to Pasoral to test out other dishes or their bibimbap. But, sadly, kimbap is not on their menu - a disturbing absence I've noticed lately at other Korean restaurants.

Pastoral
205 S. 13th St., Philadelphia, PA 19107
215-545-8511
Mon.-Sat., 11:30am-10pm; Sun., closed

My Favorite Eats...Ever!

OK, so I've told you on this blog that I'm originally from South Carolina, but I've never mentioned what town. I was born, raised, and spent the better part of almost three decades in Columbia, the capital of South Carolina. With the seat of government, the main campus of the University of South Carolina, and the Army's basic training facility, Fort Jackson, Columbia is filled with mostly government workers, students, and army families.

Columbia is not at the white sand beaches, nor is it in the rolling foothills of the mountains, but smack dab in the middle of the state, and, I might add, the hottest most humid city with nary a breeze you will ever set foot in. (People from other Southern towns and Southeast Asian countries never believe that statement...until they've spent a summer there)

Really, there's no reason for you to go to or be in Columbia (I'm not dissing Columbia; all of my childhood and young adult memories are there, and I love them all), but if you ever do find yourself there, the following are my three favorite restaurants of all time, and, really, the only reason (besides family) that I return. I dream of these restaurants and their food -- all ethnic and all hole-in-the-wall/casual. Old location.

My absolute number one favorite restaurant in Columbia is Touch of India (link for address purposes only; ignore the poor reviews by people that have only been there once), a restaurant run by Devi, the sweetest woman ever. Devi and her family only serve Southern Indian dishes, and I have never eaten at an Indian restaurant that serves food as good as hers. Fresh and with love. I kick myself for not taking cooking classes with her, but I took all her food for granted. We would line up before she opened her doors at 11 (show up late, and it's gone) almost every Sunday for their small, but quality lunch buffet.

My favorites from the menu: mysore masala dosa, dahi puri, and cabbage (not on the menu, but cabbage will pop up occasionally as the veggie of the day).Sadly, I didn't make it to Touch of India this last go round, but that picture above is from a trip to her buffet the last time I was in town (buffet plates are never pretty). Since the last trip, she has moved her operation out of the most run-down, dismal, dead strip mall behind a dead strip mall you've ever seen to a brand new building. Yay! She worked for it. Next up is Bangkok, one of Columbia's first Thai restaurants that still sits in the same strip mall near Fort Jackson Army Base and does a bangin' take-out and sit-down lunch and dinner business. Same cooks, same servers (now with more gray hair!), same stains on the walls and carpet. Massaman curry...mmm.

There's nothing fancy about this place, but they dish out some good food. Is it better than your favorite Thai restaurant? Probably not. But it was my first, and I judge all Pad Thai and Massaman curry (my favorites) by their versions. Still, many people in Columbia love their dishes and proclaim them the best Thai, and that many people can't be wrong. I know I'm never wrong.Blue Cactus is probably the quirkiest restaurant in town, but is a must. You'd never know from the name or the outside of the restaurant that Blue Cactus serves Korean, Cuban, and Southwestern food. This restaurant is run by Lloyd (loves spicy food), who is a one-man show at the stove in their open kitchen; his wife (so quiet and cute, I've never caught her name) who brings her Korean expertise; and their daughter, Julie, who has been single-handedly waiting on your sorry ass since Blue Cactus opened in 1994. It's a family serving food they know and love, and doing it well.
Lloyd in his kitchen.

A few things to know before your first visit to Blue Cactus:

• Blue Cactus has a motto and its: Good food takes time...and we're real good! Lloyd is the only guy cooking, and his wife does the non-cooked dishes like kimbap and bibimbap, so if you go in at prime lunch time, you may be there for one and a half hours...or more! If you're in a hurry, go late in the afternoon, or just go when you have time. Oh, and so you don't waste more time, go to the register when you're done, and tell them what you ate; they don't bring you a check.
  

• Lloyd loves spicy food. Ask for it hot and it'll burn. There's a whole shelf of hot sauces if you'd like to try them...and bring him a bottle, too.

• Blue Cactus is not a traditional Korean restaurant. Don't go in expecting twenty complimentary banchan dishes. Kimchi is on the menu, if you want it.

• The Reese family is super nice (Julie even remembers my name and order after being gone for so long), but are not your bitches. Julie waits on you like she's a normal person (and like I would to if I were a server), so will roll her eyes if you ask her a stupid question. Remember Blue Cactus' motto? If you call the restaurant on your cell phone from your table to ask where your food is (true story), Lloyd will escort your ass out of his restaurant. It's sort of like Shopsin's in there, except I think Kenny Shopsin is missing a few screws and is unnecessarily harsh, and the Reeses have all of their mental faculties and you've got to be a real ass-wipe to get the Reese family smack down.

My favorites:
Bibimbap with tofu and without the fried egg, Kimbap just made by Mom so the rice is still warm, and Japchea with tofu.

Meju

Update: No longer open.

I stumbled upon the newly opened BYOB Korean restaurant, Meju, in Old City a few weeks ago. It was after 10p.m., and I was already happily liquored-up when I walked in the cozy BYOB that was getting ready to close. Unaware of their hours, I asked if they were closing. Yes, but they happily set a table for us.

Now, I would never impose on a hard-working, tired restaurant crew (I make a point to not even enter restaurants 30 minutes before closing), but they seemed genuinely carefree and unbothered by our presence. Had they rolled their eyes or hesitated, instead of cheerfully waiving us in, I would have gladly turned around.

After the lone dinner party remaining exited, the crew cleaned up, and set themselves down at the table behind us and had a snack and chat, all the while attentively and happily attending to our table. The service was so genuinely nice – not even considering we were there after hours.

I came in really seeking a late night snack of kimbap, Korea’s version of sushi. I used to eat kimbap every week at my favorite Korean/Southwestern restaurant (unlikely combination) in my hometown (and, dang, if they aren't closed at Xmas when I go home), so miss kimbap very much. Sliced thinner than sushi, the carrot, pickled daikon, and spinach-filled kimbap is great for people like me with small mouths – tasty, too.

We also ordered the vegetarian dolsot bibimbap, a rice dish served in a scorching-hot stone bowl and topped with vegetables and tofu. Our food came with about eight of so small dishes of spicy banchan, which we polished off. Never once trying to rush our table, the nice server offered us refills of our banchan. We declined, as we were stuffed and didn’t want to take up more of their time.

Besides the food being excellent (sorry, no pics; I was not anticipating eating out), I am truly amazed at how nice the staff was to a couple of people who walked in after hours. I’m doing a side job tomorrow a block from Meju, and I know exactly where I’m eating when my day is done.

Meju, 213 Chestnut St., Philadelphia, PA, 19106
215-238-9403

Gaja Gaja

Update: no longer open.

Places open and close all the time on South Street. Gaja Gaja, a Japanese/Korean restaurant, opened their doors a few weeks ago amid the bars and cheese steak purveyors along this tourist hell hole. I thought I’d give Gaja Gaja a go, since lately I can’t seem to get enough sushi.

The small interior is minimal-chic, and the open store front makes for great people watching in the warmer months. We sat by the open front, but because the tables were so close together, the only way to get to the far side of our table without asking the person at the next table to move was to step through the window.

The sushi is your standard fare, and there’s nothing exotic when it comes to their veggie sushi variety – cucumber, avocado, kampyo, and shitake mushroom. They were accommodating in letting me sub a veggie roll for the California roll that comes with the 14-piece lunch special. (Fake crab meat is not vegetarian; it’s fish. I don’t know how many people tell me I can eat California rolls because it’s not real crab.) The sushi rice was slightly undercooked, but hopefully that was just an off batch.

I could kill my self for not remembering the name of the Korean dish my partner ordered, but it’s basically a cold soba noodle dish with assorted vegetables and an egg on top with accompanying hot red pepper sauce – like bibimbap, but with noodles instead of rice. This dish of noodles and fresh vegetables was light and healthy, but I couldn’t help thinking the salad-like, fresh, unseasoned vegetables were a watered down version of what you might get at a more authentic Korean restaurant. I’m just used to getting pickled veggies on top of my big bowl of rice/noodles at Korean joints. And Gaja Gaja didn’t offer any kimchi to toss in the bowl. Isn’t kimchi almost mandatory?

Miso soup accompanied both of our lunch specials.

If you’re on South Street and are looking for lighter fare than the cheese steaks that scent the street, Gaja Gaja’s sushi and Korean-esque food might be your ticket. Get there before it changes.

Gaja Gaja, 627 South St., Philadelphia, PA 19147
215-923-0313
Sun.-Thus., 11:30 a.m-10 p.m.; Fri.-Sat., 11:30 a.m.-11 p.m.; closed Mon.

Homemade Bibimbap...Sort Of

Is there such a thing as a mail-order mom? If there is, I’ll take an Indian mom, a Thai mom, a Japanese mom, an Italian mom… Aw heck, I’ll just take one of every kind. I love my Mom dearly, and she’s a great cook, but she never shared the secrets of making curry or kimchi with me. She does not know how to make authentic dishes from around the world.

I have discovered the closest thing to a surrogate Korean mom I’m going to find. I call my new mom Yong’s Oriental Food Mart. She lives in a strip mall on Kirkwood Highway on the outskirts of Wilmington, Delaware. Yong’s is a small Korean market right next to an Asian gift store, and Kahl-Bee Korean restaurant. All three places are owned by the same people.

The best part about Mom's… um, Yong’s... is that the cooler is stocked with some of the same Korean food components that are served at the restaurant next door. They just pack up food like kimchi and spicy tofu that will be showing up in your meal at Kahl-Bee, and sell it at the market. All you have to do is pick up the components to a Korean meal and assemble the dish at home.Starting at top: seasoned mung bean sprouts, spicy tofu, seasoned cucumber (I made that one), sweet beans (I don't know their real name, but they're good), seasoned mustards, kimchi cabbage, seasoned fern stems.

I visit Young’s when I have a hankering for bibimbap at home. I just pick up assorted containers of already prepared vegetables and tofu, and all I have to do is make rice. Easy! The containers have enough vegetables to make a family-size meal, or feed a single person for days. Don’t forget to pick up a bottle of kochujang sauce to top off the bibimbap.

If you want to get all Martha-like and do it from scratch, you can start here. Since my Mom has never shown me the secrets of Korean food, I don’t even try.

Yong’s Oriental Food Mart, 2017 Kirkwood Highway, Wilmington, DE 19805, Phone: (302)994-4664

Giwa

Sometimes (sometimes) I’m jealous of salaried desk jockeys that get to take lunch breaks. I don’t get paid when I’m not working, so eat a PB&J with one hand, and work with the other hand five days out of the week. I’d love to eat something more exotic for lunch, so, when I had a day off a while back, I joined my partner for a rare lunch date at Giwa. Giwa is a Center City Korean joint on the 1600 block of Sansom Street that serves “simple, good Korean food.”

During the lunch hour rush, the place is packed. Look past these people and you’ll see a clean and modern interior with stone veneer walls, small glossy tables, and narrow counters along the wall and the prep area. The space feels like a trendy Korean fast food restaurant, and that’s what I’d call it – the food is even served on those familiar orange trays.

The menu is limited to a handful of appetizers, soups, and entrees; not nearly as many options as you would get at most Korean restaurants. I’m sure the limited menu helps facilitate a speedy lunch that desk jockeys demand. Also, don’t expect a plethora of complimentary banchan (small Korean side dishes) that you normally get at more formal sit down restaurants. There’s no way to eat a speedy lunch if you have ten side dishes. Plus, they wouldn’t fit on the orange tray!

My favorite appetizer, kimbap, was not on the menu. Kimbap is Korean sushi – thinly sliced rolls filled with pickled daikon, spinach, carrots, and egg. Why it’s not on the menu, I don’t know.

My favorite entree, bibimbap, was on the menu. Bibimbap is basically a large bowl of rice with many types of vegetables, meat, and a fried egg on top. This all ends up getting eaten mixed together with kimchi, and kochujang sauce – a spicy, ketchup-like condiment. For $8.50, I ordered the vegetarian bibimbap without an egg, instead of the $9.50 bibimbap with tofu.

The rice bowl came out topped with cabbage, carrots, lettuce, red peppers, seasoned greens, seasoned mushrooms, and shredded nori. Kimchi, kochujang, and seasoned mung bean sprouts were on the side. The vegetables were fresh, but either not seasoned or lightly seasoned. Where were the more exotic fern stems, pickled daikon, and other pickled or fermented vegetables I normally get at Korean restaurants? I felt like Giwa’s bibimbap had been dumbed-down for the masses.

I dumped the kimchi, bean sprouts, and hot sauce in the bowl, then shoveled the rice and vegetable mixture in my mouth. It was “simple, good Korean food,” even if it was not the most authentic bibimbap I’ve ever had. If I could get paid to take a lunch break, I’d be back for my Korean fast food fix.

Giwa, 1608 Sansom Street, Philadelphia, PA 19103, 215-557-9830
Mon.-Fri., 11am-8pm; Sat., 12pm-9:30pm; Sun., closed.