Most folks who know me, and especially those who have asked me if I'd ever eaten Korean food have usually been surprised that I haven't. That is until this last Sunday when my good friend and fellow foodie-companion Noah and his girlfriend Momoko popped my Korean-cuisine cherry. Noah was visiting New York from Memphis and was excited to show me a Korean spot that he found a while ago when he was living in Queens. He admitted that there might be better Korean spots in the city, however the location, setting, and modest prices of this place help to keep him a loyal customer. Those said factors also have me hooked, line and sinker.
Haewoondae Korean Restaurant. Sounds like a hybrid of Hyundai and Daewoo.
Both are Korean manufacturers.
I just really like the place-mat set-up (and the leather bound menu), not to mention the wax-paper sheathed spoon.
Here's the initial spread. It's a bunch of side dishes that you kind of do whatever you want with. These items were described to me by the waiter in English, so I don't have transliterational words for them (except for kim-chee). Starting at the far left and going clockwise from the top: Seaweed in a dressing, seasoned black beans, bean curd (tofu) with seasoning, flavored egg-plant, smoked mackerel, sliced cucumber, pasta salad with fruit and beans, and kim chee. Then a big salad closest to the bottom.
After they drop off the first 9 dishes, they bring out the main meat dishes that were initially ordered with the server. There are something like four main sections of the menu. There is a barbecued meat section, a noodle section, a random item section, and a couple of others. We opted to pick two items from the barbecue section so that we could have our meat cooked at the table.
This was called "Cha Dol Baki Gui". It is described in the menu as "thin sliced corned beef in sesame oil and salt side dip." It made for a delicious meal, that's for sure.
Thank you for cooking my Cha Dol Baki Gui right in front of me.
It started to sizzle and cook kind of like a salty beef bacon.
Noah picked this bad boy...and I'm really glad he did. It was the first item on the barbecue section and is called "Kalbi Gui". It is described in the menu as "chunks of moist tender boneless part of beef short ribs marinated with house special BBQ sauce at table."
They don't do the whole cheesy Benihana style of fun, but it's classier and local- that's for sure.
So here's the deal. After they cook up the freshly seared meats, they just start putting portions of it on your plate. You then take a leaf of lettuce from a basket and put the meat and whatever else you want inside of it. In this leaf, I placed the thin beef and some black beans. Wrap it up and eat. Goodness.
I neglected to mention the peanut and sesame oil side dish each person gets with the meal. On the bottom right you will see a dish that has a peanut based paste on the left and a sesame oil sauce on the right. Here I lathered the lettuce in the two sauces, placed the Kalbi Gui on top of that, and then on top of that I placed some of the marinated cucumber and kim-chee. This was my favorite combo for sure. I also placed a big chunk of mackerel on top of my rice. Salty salty good.
Noah attacks the smoked fishes. They were really, really tasty.
I felt that the kim-chee merited it's own picture.
This was succulently flavored cabbage: hot and spice and everything nice.
After I disclosed the fact that I am writing a food blog to the waitress, an expediter brought out two complimentary soups that are featured in the picture. They are in the black bowls in the center.
This is the soybean curd soup. It was awesome and had lots of onions and spicy green peppers in it.
The waiter called this "steamed egg soup". To me it tasted like what real egg-drop soup should taste like. It didn't have that corn-syrup base that most Chinese restaurants use in their egg-drops. This soup had a good stock base and a large amount of steamed egg that had a custard consistency. They topped it with chives and it really made an excellent addition to the beefy meal.
Well I thoroughly enjoyed my first Korean experience. The quality of everything was excellent, without question. Momoko, who comes from a Japanese family, was so taken with the fresh and authentic, Asian quality of everything that she had to pause for a moment to take it all in. To top it all off, the jaw-dropping cost of everything in the end was really incredible....I don't think the bill was more than $40. With that said, I believe that Haewoondae Korean Restaurant in Elmhurst Queens is totally worth the trek. It can be found at 7532 Broadway in Elmhurst/Jackson Heights Queens via the 7/E/F/M and R lines. And if you're up to it when you're done, you can visit one of the local Asian or Indian supermarkets in the area; there are all sorts of goodies to be found in those places.
- Boatner
- Boatner
