GO! DINING REVIEW: Heart, Seoul and adventure

Some people escape the workaday world and find adventure counting the number of 14ers they conquer. The mountains’ very existence challenges them.

 This week I found Seoul Tofu Grill, and I think I finally understand. The very existence of that 90-item menu of Korean flavor challenges me — nay, begs me — to try each and every one.

Even better, there’s no need to start training for this adventure. With its mixture of authentic Korean and California Koreatown recipes, Seoul offers both mild and spicy, familiar and exotic, and bargains and extravagances to suit the taste and budget of any culinary traveler.

Lighter highlights

Be warned that nothing is small here, and your table can easily fill up edge to edge with food. Such is certainly true with the well-priced bento boxes ($7.50, served 11 a.m.-2:30 p.m. weekdays), which come with tofu broth soup, salad, three kimchi sides and rice in addition your meat choice. While at the timid end of the spectrum, the bentos are great lunch fodder, and the Dukgogi Tansuyook is basically a battered sweet-sour chicken with an unfamiliar name.

The Soon Tofu soups ($7.50 lunch, $9 dinner) are likely where Seoul gets its “tofu grill” name, and they are so much fun to eat. The soup is served boiling hot in a stone pot, into which you can crack the accompanying raw egg to cook. The tofu and vegetable soup was the standout, but if you have the guts (sorry), the soup is also an opportunity to sample a small amount of beef tripe, which is cow guts.

(Answer to your unspoken question: very chewy, but with a light meaty taste that flavored the broth nicely.)

If you like wontons, pot stickers or any variation of stuffed dumplings, there’s nothing to fear about the Mondu ($6.50, served steamed, pan fried or deep fried). If you want to step outside that comfort zone, the seafood pancake ($15) is a savory egg-and-flour patty the size of a medium pizza with encased scallions, shrimp, squid, oysters, mussels and crab.

Dinner highlights

The Kalbi beef short ribs ($19) truly shine and sizzle on their hot-from-the-kitchen skillet. The ribs are cut perpendicular to the bone, which leaves a finger-width bone handle for you to grab the ovals of tender, marinated meat — and anyone who loves good barbecue will grab for more.

If you have the urge to order the Ohjinguh Bokum stir-fried squid ($13), you need not the courage to pronounce it. Ask for the No. 22, ask for it spicy, and enjoy how the carrots, cabbage, mushrooms and red pepper sauce complement the perfectly cooked spirals of squid.

As for the table grill section of the menu, you really can’t go wrong. The server who runs the portable grill tableside can guide you through the more unfamiliar foods, such as the Hookdaeji Samgyupsal raw pork belly ($17), which should be dipped in the provided sauce of sesame oil, salt and pepper while hot.

He or she will also dish out the Sogogi Jumoolluk marinated choice beef ($18) to each plate like a doting parent, along with the onions, mushrooms and potatoes that accompany any table grill.

Side highlights

This is my favorite part of the adventure: Small bowls of various toppings, sauces and sides are provided with most lunch and dinner entrees, and diners are encouraged to sample, mix and match. The homemade Napa cabbage kimchi is likely the best I’ve ever tasted, and both dishes of daikon radish (one slightly pickled and one in chile sauce) were delicious.

Each person has a lidded container of sticky rice, but at dinner, I recommend using the provided lettuce leaves, too. Wrap up your entrée with Seoul’s bean-paste sauce, raw garlic and jalapeño, and kimchi for yet another way to experience the flavors of Korea.

Service

Every dish is served hot, fresh and fast from the kitchen, and while attentive, the servers allow diners space to enjoy the experience. Operating the table grill is time-intensive, but it’s done with a smile and lots of great suggestions about flavor combinations.

Ambience

The interior is fresh and stylish, with wooden accents in trim, shutters and table dividers. The dividers were the highlight for me, because most tables felt entirely secluded, like a private railcar just for your party. Private rooms are also available.

Drawbacks

The exterior of the location in the South Academy Boulevard strip mall is very low-rent for the restaurant’s lovely interior and, more important, for some of the restaurant’s prices. Seoul’s table grills are also problematic, not in taste, but because a table must order two or none at all, and the bill can rack up pretty fast.

The restaurant currently has no alcohol, which, if I’m having a special-occasion dinner of that magnitude, is a shame. Also, for a place with tofu in its name, it’s not vegetarian friendly: For lunch, no bento boxes and only one soup qualified. 

 My personal drawback is the scoreboard. Me: 9. Seoul: 90, and there are new specials not on the regular menu! I better get trekking.