Korean Village – 628 Bloor St W, Toronto, ON M6G 1K7
Country: Korea
Seating: Large indoor space
Must-try dish: Gal Bi
Dinner guest: Young Matt

If you’re ever going to overstay your welcome at a dining establishment, this is the place, In fact, we encourage it. 

I’m going to be honest, we were pumped about the kimchi, which didn’t disappoint, but our eyes were open to a whole new world of Korean cuisine in the process. The menu was daunting, so we opted to get suggestions from our server who hails from Seoul. He guided us in the direction of two raw beef dishes that we could cook on a grill at the table, and a very spicy octopus noodle dish. Alongside this order, we each had a small soup and five plates of pickled vegetables and fish, one of which was kimchi. 

It took all our strength not to devour the initial plates that arrived only a minute after we placed the order  but we knew that there were great things ahead. 

Our dinner guest offered to man the grill and each slice of beef was cooked perfectly. Of the two beef dishes that we ordered, one was thinner and the other was thicker with more fat. The general consensus was that the fattier dish Gal Bi, took the prize for our favourite meal of the evening. A bonus of the Gal Bi and Bul Go Gi is that a sauce made of soybean paste comes with it. Although we tried our best to ration it, the entire bowl was gone before half the meat was cooked. 

It was difficult to steer our attention to the other dish – the Octopus Bokum. It’s a noodle dish with small pieces of octopus in the sauce. It had the feel of a pasta, with a more exotic flare. Although the flavours were well matched and the consistency was excellent between sauce and noodles, you should know that it’s a much spicier dish than anything we had on the table. 

Finally, with full tummies and little sense of urgency to get to our feet, we sat at our table with the bill staring at us for longer than usual knowing that we would eventually have to make our way to the cash to settle up. One of our servers came up to ask us if we wanted any dessert, and without giving us the time to answer, he offered us chocolate ice cream on the house. Naturally, the answer was yes and we couldn’t help but thinking that maybe taking your time leads to rewards in the Korean culture. 

Either way, we loved the generous offering of dessert and look forward to a trip to Korea, where perhaps we can count on a daily serving of the chocolatey cold stuff.

Eat with you soon, 

Mandrea Bike
(Mat & Andrea)