Invasion of the Korean Restaurants: Samgyeopsal House, Hodori Noodle House & Keumsan Korean Restaurant

Anyong haseyo, my foodie friends! Welcome to the watagata edition of Here, There, Everywhere.  ^^,

The little samgyeopsal house on General Luna.

The Korean term translates more correctly as ‘come and go’ but you know what I’m getting at. =b In the past few months, Race and I have noticed an influx of food establishments offering Korean dishes.  We already have ramyeon houses like Mr. Ramyon, Red Station and Geney’s Ramyeon House on our list and in July, more Korean restaurants were added in.  We’ve got to do a writeup on these particular restaurants now before more open up. *hihi

1.) O Dong Tong Samgyeopsal House Korean Restaurant

[UPDATE 11/28/2017: Just got word that O Dong Tong moved to 115 Rainbow Building, Naguilian Road. (Just a few steps away from St. Vincent Church.)]

O Dong Tong Samgyeopsal House menu *click for a larger view

Race and I found ourselves at the cute Samgyeopsal House after seeing it in a couple of drive bys in Upper General Luna. (It’s between Rose Bowl and Casa Generosa’s Concoctions and Reverie.) [UPDATE 11/28/2017: Just got word that O Dong Tong moved to 115 Rainbow Building, Naguilian Road. (Just a few steps away from St. Vincent Church.)] The space used to be a mini steak house and I got pretty curious about how they fixed it all up inside with such limited space to work with.  (I liked what I saw from the outside, the proprietor’s attention to detail with hanging easy to roll away transparent covers on the windows and door. It must get major blustery here during typhoon season. *hee)

Bibimbap ^^,

Inside, it was a nice and cozy, brightly painted dining area. (Hey there, Mashimaro-s, long time, no see!) Shifting our attention to the menu, we decided to try their samgyeopsal (of course) and their bibimbap.  For drinks, they’ve got a familiar selection of canned Korean beverages that instantly got me reminiscing about my tutoring days.  ♪  timpintin-pintin ♫

Inside the samgyeopsal house

The way they plated up the bibimbap here is one of the prettiest I’ve seen.  They used the various of colors of the different veggies skillfully making the dish look even more appetizing.  Generously sprinkled with sesame seeds, it’s a metal bowl of food that we eagerly mixed up so we can dig in. =)

Leafy greens and crunchy light greens

For P150, we got a small helping of samgyeopsal meant to be wrapped and eaten with Romaine lettuce and Chinese cabbage.  (This doesn’t happen often but when it does, Race welcomes biting into the juicy crunchy stalks/leaves of the wombok). Only kimchi was given as a side dish at O Dong Tong but it was okay.  It was the most organized little saucer of the banchan I ever got. =)) The samgyeopsal set came with a few slices of potatoes and onion rings that you can fry along with the green chilies that could also work as extra side dishes anyway.

Samgyeopsal

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2.) Hodori Noodle House

Inside the noodle house

Being stuck in slow moving traffic isn’t such a bad thing … for me, the passenger. (Wreaks havoc on Race’s hands, the poor guy. Big hugs, love!) On the way to FOTD on Naguilian Road corner Quezon Hill Road 2 (right by the arc), I saw Hodori Noodle House is on the first floor of Rommel Suites, 168 Naguilian Road (across from T. Library Restobar)  about two blocks before we all turn right and up to go to Quezon Hill, coming from a little trip there, when we didn’t find San Maru (also permanently closed according to Google Maps. Aw, we missed their samgyeopsal all you can), we stopped over at the noodle house so our drive all the way there wouldn’t be for nothing.

More side dishes

We were in for a pleasant surprise with our orders here of jajangmyeon and deun jang chigae.  (“,) They were huge servings and they were deliciously filling.  As early as we ate dinner that day, I didn’t feel the need to munch on a little something before going to bed.

Hodori Noodle House menu *click for a larger view  (Check it out, rice toppings with soup are P99 only from 12:00 noon to 2:00 p.m.)

Inasmuch as this other Hodori (a branch of the Hodori at Mabini Street) had their fried chicken dishes as their best sellers according to our attendant (I’m thinking it must be like Good Taste’s buttered chicken), they did so well with Race’s black soy bean paste noodles and my brown soybean paste stew.

Deonjang stew (“,)

I thought I was going to leave the restaurant water full but no, my tummy had scrumptious little clams, potatoes, zucchini, mushrooms, pork and rice. I even had enough to get to go for breakfast the next morning.

Race’s noodle selection was delish, too. It had zucchini cubes and other indiscernible veggies tossed in with the noodles. I can understand why the Korean kids I used to tutor went all bonkers when they heard black noodles jajangmyeon was the snack of the day.

Jajangmyeon *burp

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3.) Keumsan Korean Restaurant

Kimchi chigae *whew, spiceeey

Coming from stalking The Camp and finding it not open then, we were glad to have a backup with just going further up Leonard Wood Road (beside Grumpy Joe) and still getting to check a newly opened restaurant from our Baguio restaurant list.  Keumsan Korean Restaurant was a sight for sore eyes and a relief for our growling stomachs. *shyeew

Bibimbap =)

Serving a washbasin sized bowl of zingy kimchi jjigae and a just the right size bowl of bibimbap covered almost completely with torn kim, our visit to this resto was so fulfilling that we decided to go back when one foodie friend had a hankering for Korean foods … from a place she’s never tried yet. (Shout out to Ate Terry! =D)

Accompaniments to various Keumsan meals – more and more side dishes, soup for bibimbap, pajori and leafy greens for samgyeopsal

There’s nothing better than a samgyeopsal party when you’ve got extra company eating at a Korean restaurant. The frying of the strips of pork, the reaching from one part of the table to the other completing your tasty meal-in-a-bite wraps gives such a great feeling of togetherness.  Kumbaya!  *heehaha While we were frying the meat, our attendant (most likely the owner) even joined in, in the turning of the meat.  (She must’ve thought we’re getting into the conversation so much, we were going to burn it *teehee.)

Sizzling cooking pork strips …

There’s also something very gourmet about the food served at this particular establishment … the presentation, the selection, etc.  Here, I thought, I’ve tried every kind of side dish there was in the City of Pines and Keumsan surprised me with tiny leafy greens mixed in deonjang. We also ordered ojingeo/squid sundae.  Don’t be grossed out, it’s not ice cream but stuffed squid, Korean style. Imagine kimbap inside perfectly cooked, tender squid. (Second squid dish that I really like now. *giggles)

Ojingeo sundae =b

Orders at Keumsan also come with the most suitable accompaniments. Race’s mixed rice order from our first visit came with a small bowl soup (it might have been deonjang stew or miso). My kimchi soup had rice that was placed in one heavy duty heat keeping bowl (Boy, did it stay hot throughout the whole meal *youch).

All fried and ready for wrapping.

The samgyeopsal was served with an individual pajori dish for everyone at the table, that tasted wonderful.  This Korean scallion/green onion salad that was so good, it rivaled my favorite at Wood Nymph SM.

Keumsan dining =D

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*Adding Keumsan Restaurant to my favorites. Yeh!

Keumsan Korean restaurant menu *click for a larger view

Below is a photo of my leftover kimchi chigae from Keumsan.  Look, how they packed it. We were wondering what was taking so long and then we got this.  They were working the thingamajig that securely seals the container by heating  cellophane onto the container sides. \m/

Leftover take away \m/

X marks O Dong Tong Samgyeopsal House, Hodori Noodle House, and Keumsan Korean Restaurant for good food in Baguio.  It’s a Korean food invasion. A-sa! *Zolaman victory poses