Kogi Korean in Eastwood Mall

For me the 2 best signs of a great Korean restaurant is 1) the number of *free* banchan (free refills show that these people have the authentic korean attitude since in Korean homes, banchan is always unlimited, it is a sign of a good host) and 2) the taste of their kimchi (oh man, what kind of well meaning korean can’t make a good batch of kimchi? it’s their national side dish and side dish, added and eaten with almost all their food proudly!)

Because in Korean culture the banchan is a must for every meal. They are side dishes that should be eaten with the food.
Kimchi is an integral part of Korean cuisine. It is made up of fermented vegetables and chili paste.

Anyway without further ado, what we had at kogi:

Spicy crispy shrimp:
The shrimp was salty crisp but not so spicy, even if we told them to make it ultra-spicy. I ate mine with shells and all just to stress the point that this was crispy shrimp. Flavor wise, it had the korean components. Crispness was almost about to get disappointing, but we ate it quick enough that we still reached that “before it gets soft” point.

Chicken kalbi:
It had a sweetish barbeque sauce and is eaten with plum sauce and bean dip. Lettuce is the only kind of veggie in the platter, no garlic, no chili and of course, no ketnip. Quite disappointing. But it tasted okay.

Staff is helpful friendly and our banchan is refilled only twice, since the portions are so tiny you kind of try not to eat the side dishes too quickly. Refills over two, we were told, will be charged (geez).

Bibimbap looks so festive because of the huge pot that comes into your table. But the serving is quite small. It doesn’t have kimchi in the mixture (I knew I should’ve saved my free banchan for this one!). It’s just a bunch of sauteed and steamed veggies, arranged on a cup of rice with about  1/4 cup of cooked ground meat. Well at least there was a tiny rice crust at the bottom from the heat of the pot it was in. Topped with an egg and gojuchang, a spicy korean paste used i lots of korean dishes. Usually a bibimbap would use sliced meat along with some kimchi.

Flavor is still pretty good. Not yet too filipinized or economized but the ingredients are pretty much scarce. Variety of ingredients in the dishes we ate versus some of the authentic places we’ve gone to is a far cry. But what can you really expect from a mall setting considering the soaring prices of rent CUSA and percentage. Still the food was affordable even if they sacrificed serving size and variety of ingredients (this meaning they opted to remove the lovely extra ingredients to a dish). It was affordable on a per dish basis, but you feel that their servings are quite small.