Food In Shanghai (Part 5)

On towards day 5, the feeling of camaraderie at its best and basically, everyone is feeling very comfortable where they are already. Life has more or less gotten to be around this group of people you've spent 5 long days with. Albeit all filled with fun and laughter. Well, for dinner this day, we've decided on Korean food! (yep, its getting to be quite a habit to have different cuisine instead of Chinese in China...hmmm...what does that say of the food there i wonder?)

Korean Cuisine

Anyhow, the place is extremely near my hotel and is just one street across. The location is average looking and you would be forgiven for choosing the wrong one because on the same floor, there were quite a few different Korean restaurants. I'll just jump the gun and say the service here was great (with the exception of this cashier lady who was extremely fierce.). It provided the best service we've had in China since our arrival. It was so good that we actually decided to tip the serving lady and we did. She did a wonderful job of balancing and serving 4 tables at one shot while still providing explanations, cooked food and service with a smile. Now thats good service.

Side Dishes

Fresh Greens

Kimchi

The choice of side dishes is excellent to say the least. Refillable, the dishes do not repeat and basically, the sides were good. The kimchi, fried beancurds and beansprouts all satisfy with their authentic Korean taste. That is never easy and even more so since this is Shanghai we are talking about. Definitely worth a try.

Vegetable Pancake

We had a multi dish set men again at the recommendation of the lady boss. She recommended a 6 person set meal but we decided upon a 4 person meal with side additions. Good choice too. Because the actual portions, side dishes and meat were anything but miserly. Up first, the vegetable pancake above. It was lightly battered with crunchy cabbages, mushrooms, eggs and asparagus. And despite being fried, had very little oil when we bit into it. The fragrance it provides with each bite was excellent and we were tempted to order another on the spot, but there were more items to come.

Seafood Pancake

The seafood pancake was surprisingly small, what you see here is a slice of the original pancake after the lady split into 5 portions. I can tell you though, the pancake was still done well, crunchy shrimps with the wonderful fragrance of lightly spring fried onions accompany each bite. Shame on the portion size for this though.

Beef Tarte

Having had much Japanese cuisine, raw fish is no longer a novelty but rather a norm but raw beef is a first for me. Braving the unknown, me and Dean decided to have this dish to share. It came looking a winner. Egg yoke seating atop a bed of fresh reddish meat with a smattering of grounded nuts. Squeeze a little lemon over it, mix the contents up a bit and start eating. The texture was very tender and chewy. Like extremely tenderized chewing gum but better. The meat had a mixture of sweet, sour and a dash of peanut fragrance. Eating too much of it though, made me feel a little nauseous. Still good though, wouldn't mind eating it again.

Beef

Pork

Another Look

More Beef!!

The Grand Reunion

Let me just summarize the meat selection we had, beef, beef, pork and more beef. I had enough beef this day to remember for ages. Its made even better when all the beef were marinated very well and went perfectly with the side vegetables for better effect. Tender, fragrant and plentiful. I really can't say enough about it to illustrate the feeling. Its just great and much better then even the Singapore Ju Shin Jung that i have reviewed previously. In fact, the reason i crave Korean food in Singapore is due to this place. Yeah, its good alright.

Korean Pot Noodles....with beef!

We were already stuffed to the brim in meat and greens when this big....make that enormous pot of noodles were brought to the table. I kid you not, we stared at the pot and laughed when we saw it because there was no way we could eat the pot of noodles after everything prior to it. However, i was wrong, this pot of noodles tasted excellent. Imagine ginseng with bak kut tea and assorted other herbs to brew the broth. The broth was nothing short of amazing and we lapped it all up in the end. We couldn't finish the noodles which was a huge regret because the noodles were equally well done and very springy. The beef was normal but anything in that broth automatically invites you to finish it. At the end of the dinner, we were thinking we could have saved loads of money by simply ordering this pot in the beginning. This alone would have satisfied all five of us and all of my pals agreed on that. DO NOT MISS THIS if you are in the area.

Ginger Tea

Ginger tea. As i've mentioned before, this is an acquired taste but sadly, i've not acquired the taste for it when i first had it. It was subsequent visits that made me like it.

Overall Score: 7.75/10

Last Word:
What can i say, the best Korean food i've had thus far. Try it for yourself. Oh, the meal cost less then 20 bucks a person. Yep, value for money and definitely a keeper.