Dongbu Live Fish

 Dongbu Live Fish is a small, family-run restaurant located in a small Rowland Heights strip mall. The specialty at Dongbu is hwal uh, which refers to the Korean-style sashimi.

Upon entering the small restaurant, you see live fish and other sea creatures swimming in saltwater tanks. Although Dongbu’s menu is filled sushi and other items, the star of the show is the live halibut sashimi. It comes in four sizes from x-small to large. The XS is $65. Don’t trust the size! It is a lot of food since it comes with multiple other dishes. An XS could probably feed three people.

 Our meal started with quail eggs, edamame, and an array of Korean condiments to accompany our appetizers. Next came soup and salad. The salad was like a cole slaw with a sweet vinaigrette sauce. It also had roe and halibut and tossed inside as well. The star of the show of course is the freshly caught halibut. It is served on an ice platter. The sashimi tastes extremely fresh. We also wrapped the halibut in the lettuce leaves provided.  Accompanying the halibut platter were eight additional dishes. The raw abalone was a bit chewy. The naengmyeon aka cold noodle was one of my faveorites. It had salmon, halibut, fruits, and cabbage all mixed in with a kick of spice! 

Next they brought out baked mussels with imitation crab. We also had shrimp and fried sardines as well. The macakrel was grilled really nicely. The skin was perfectly crispy. The meal ended up another bowl of soup. This soup to end the meal was a spicy fish soup.

The service was exceptional. The entire family was so nice and accomdating. Despite the small parking lot, there are a few spaces reserved for Dongbu customers so make sure to check before you go parking across the street. Enjoy!

18785 Colima Rd.

Rowland Heights, CA 91748

Cheese & Meat? Oh My! Korean Food in Beijing!

I was really surprised by how many Koreans there were in Beijing. Apparently Koreans are the highest minority in Beijing, which I thought was really interesting. There are a lot of areas where the streets are filled with loads of Korean restaurants and markets. Awesome. More Koreans in China equals more awesome Korean food. Most of the time when we think of Korean food, we think of Korean BBQ. I was really getting tired of eating Chinese food everyday so when some friends suggested getting Korean food, I was extremely happy. I was in fact expecting Korean BBQ, but I was introduced to something much better and weirder! 

We we given a menu where we got to choose what additional items we wanted to add to the big stone grill. We decided to add these thick white ravioli-like Korean noodles that I love. The dish already included a different type of noodles, meat, veggies, and other things inside. It was also huge!!! We had 3 people and the chef was making our 2 person order. They also brought out the japchae (Korean side dishes), which made me feel close to home even though I was half way across the world. 

The blob of food came out and then they sprinkled  cheese on top. Weird right? If you would have told me I'd be eating Korean food with cheese atop I would have been really grossed out. BUT- I guess this shows you really can't judge something until they try it because this was D-E-L-I-C-I-O-U-S!!!  You couldn't eat it alone since it was too spicy so we also got some steamed rice. Between the cheesy goodness, rice, and side dishes we got so full we wanted to roll out the door. 

Yum, yum, yum! Let's all go and put cheese on everything!!! 

Happy Eatings!

Another Rainy Day

In honor of the horrible rainy weather and of 4/20 for those of you that celebrated, I decided to do a post on crappy weather food. Here is Gushi. It's literally a shack right next to the In & Out in Westwood. It's located right across the street from the UCLA frat row, which is probably why it's a staple for drunk college kids,faded stoners, or people like me who are just hungry late at night. Gushi's is craptastic! Like all good Asian places trying not to pay taxes, they are cash only. The Korean women that work inside do not speak very good English, but I guess that just adds to the fun of it with all the miscommunication that happens. But for an average of $6-9 for a crap load of food that satisfies for at least 2 more additional meals, Gushi is golden!

See it's literally a shack!

This is their beef plate. Pour on the loads of teriyaki sauce they have there and this can feed you at least 2 meals!

Here is their beef & chicken combo. It comes with salad (not pictured), a drink, & kimchi all for $9. Score! I used to like getting food from here when I was in college & living on campus. I would save this in the fridge and eat it as 2 or 3 separate little meals instead of having to deal with campus food. Genius, I know.

Momma's Cooking

And I thought since the weather is crappy, I'd post a few pictures of my mother's recent cooking. My mom is a pain in the butt and she's refused to cook ever since she learned to drive on the freeway around 15 years ago? I've only heard stories of my mother's cooking from my grandparents on how she used to make her own curry, roast her own cha siu (BBQ pork), and cook all these amazing things. Unfortunately, in the past 15 years or so she's discovered the San Gabriel Valley to buy cheap & good food. So the rare, few times she does cook it's an occasion to celebrate.

Here's momma's black chicken soup. It was over $40 worth of goodness inside with abalone, mushrooms, dried scallops, fish stomach, and other chinese goodies.

Here are the abalone shells after momma was done washing them. She used fresh abalone instead of those canned ones so she used a toothbrush to clean them and then de-shell them.

Left is momma's veggie rice she makes and right is some awesome Japanese tofu that melts in your mouth. It's actually called Super Soft tofu. Word. Good naming folks.

And last but not least, momma's very own pandan sponge cake half eaten by yours truly.

Happy Eatings!

Torn...

(Kelly & I lunching at Starry Kitchen)

I had an amazing, scrumptious food experience today with my friend Kelly. Everything was 5 stars good. The staff was extremely nice, but I am torn... Read on to find out why. Hmph... where should I start? So let me start out by telling you the story of Starry Kitchen. It is located in Downtown LA across from MOCA and the Walt Disney Concert Hall at 350 South Grand Ave. Los Angeles, CA. It had really humble beginnings. Basically a young couple (Thi & Nguyen) started cooking in their apartment after Thi was fired from her previous advertising job. Cooking was just a hobby for her but soon their apartment turned into a full on mini restaurant that simply asked their guests for $5 donations. Guests had to sneak into their apartment, enter in secret codes to get into the gates, etc. Hardcore right? That is, until a health inspector showed up and shut down their business. Boo... but then the couple opened a cafe/restaurant in Downtown LA. The food is delicious, first of all and the total comes out to about $8.50 per meal. It's fusion food and the best part is that the menu changes every week. New dishes are rotated in and out. Nguyen actually told us that after he rotated their famous tofu balls out, he actually got hate mail in his inbox. Awesome!

So this is how Starry Kitchen works. Here is this week's menu. You join their facebook fan page for updates by clicking here.

It's a simple 1, 2, 3 process. You choose what meat you want, what type of vessel (i.e. bread, wrap, etc.) you want to hold it, and then a side dish! Under the meat section for this week was the Lemongrass Chicken, Chinese Hoison Burger, "Nom Nom" Pork, Lemongrass Tofu, & Spicy Crab Cakes aka the "Crack Crab Cakes." Yes, they are THAT good. Then you can choose whether you would like your meat placed in various salads, tortilla wraps, or bahn mi sandwiches. And last but not least, then you choose something from their daily sides. Let's go on to what we ate.

After doing our 1,2,3's we ended up with this piece of amazingness. This is the Spicy Crab Cakes with Mayo & Wasabi in a Tortilla Wrap. These crab cakes were soooo good and the wasabi was not too spicy but you could still taste it inside. The cucumbers inside also complemented the crab cakes really well. It was delicious or as Kelly said over and over again !!!Scrumptious!!!! Our side dish we chose for this dish was the cold slaw, which was mixed with sesame sauce and honey. Yum!

But the standout dish was the "Nom Nom" Pork. Wow! Amazing. First of all, the bahn mi bread was fresh and amazing. The pork tasted as if Taiwanese sasuage had a baby with amazing Vietnamese Nem Nuong and produced a hybrid of amazingness. It was just THAT good. For our side dish, we ordered Curry Rice which was good but not as good as the Curry Rice I've had at Curry House. It was still good though!

Now onto the cons to this place. Downtown LA has the worst parking. Starry Kitchen tells you to park in the American Plaza and get validated so that you only pay $3. If you forget to validate the parking becomes $50. $3 is the cheapest parking you can find. The public parking next to them is $6.50 and $8. Okay... fine. The designated parking lot is a mess! The entrances and exits are so small and the parking lot was just full on confusing. It was like going in a maze. Parking is usually free so if I'm gonna spend $3 I expect red carpet and everything. This was plain crap, but it's Downtown so I guess there's no much you can do about it. Secondly, all the one way streets were horrible. Going into oncoming traffic is not a good thing. But even with these cons and the fact that I drove over 45 minutes to get here, I felt that it was still worth it because the food was that good. That was until... I got something to go.

I was raving about how amazing this place was to the BF who then wanted to get in on some on the goodness so I bought him a Hoison Beef Hamburger in a Bahn Mi to go. I chose the Jap Chae as his side dish. I was so excited that he was going to be wowed because Kelly and I had such a good experience. I was super careful not to spoil the taste. I had them separate the sauces so that the bread would not get soggy and everything! So I delivered the dish to him and he was super disappointed as was I. I couldn't believe that something could taste bleh from Starry Kitchen. I had such high hopes. I told him to give them the benefit of the doubt since I did have to drive 45 minutes home with the food, but he was not happy and honestly neither was I. Maybe the hoison burger would have been good if he had eaten it there? I don't know but I think it will be near impossible to drag him there to give it another go. Plus, another downside to Starry Kitchen is that they have pretty bad hours. They only open from Monday-Friday from 11-3PM.

So now you know why. I'm honestly extremely torn. For me, there was no doubt in my mind that it was 5 stars perfect but after having a taste of the to go I ordered I feel as though I'm going to be torn until I go back again to eat again. By the way, next week they are switching out the "Crack Crab Cakes." Darn... those things are yummy. And the "Nom Nom" Pork... is still going to be on the menu next week. I don't know what to do. I'm so confused now. 5 stars? 4 stars? But if you just judge the to go by itself it would have been a 2 star. The Bf made a point. "Food should be good no matter if it's to go or not. The Hat's pastrami sandwiches taste good even days in the fridge." Yes... but he hasn't had Starry Kitchen's Crab Cakes or "Nom Nom" Pork. I don't know... Kelly & I loved it.

Happy Eatings. You can also visit their website here to see what dishes they have rotating in and out each week! Please let me know if anyone tries their other menu items. I'd love to hear if it really is a problem with their take out or not.

Sincerely,

Confused Soul

I Want Hawaiian Shaved Iced & No One Is Gonna Stop Me

So what do you like to do for fun? Oh, well apparently I like to risk my life to chase down food trucks in the middle of L.A.! So there's been a big buzz about this amazing shaved ice that serves melt in your mouth shaved ice from a truck in the Los Angeles/San Fernando Valley area. Even though I've heard raving reviews from word of mouth as well as online, I have to admit I was very skeptical. Why? Because real amazing shaved ice is supposed to look like this...

Left is shaved ice from Hong Kong and right is from Singapore. It has been really hard trying to find shaved ice in the U.S. aside from at a few Taiwanese places that have even been able to come remotely close to the quality of shaved ice found in Asia. But being the foodie that I am, I had to go try it. I mean, what is Hawaiian Shaved Ice anyways? Okay so my friends were off school for Spring Break so it was perfect timing to have an adventure chasing down a truck. They change locations everyday so you have to check on their website to see what their destinations for the day are. You can visit them at: www.getshavedice.com

So I checked their schedule and got my friends ready to chase them down. The website said there would be in Eagle Rock that day for the first 3 hours. Eagle Rock? Where the hell is that? It has a cool name so whatever right? So having the most awesome friends that will let me drag them into doing whatever I want food related, the Wehebs, bf & I crew went waiting for the truck to stop at Eagle Rock.

Are you seeing double? Don't worry your eyes are fine. Those are indeed 2 different times I chased after a shaved ice truck 1 day apart from each other. So obviously you can tell the shaved ice was really good! First picture is me with the Wehebs & 2nd is my cousins posing in front of the truck when it came to Chatsworth a day closer. On a side note, while we were in Eagle Rock we literally saw 8 or more cop cars light up. After Rna & Weheb got home to tell the story to Papa Weheb, apparently we shouldn't have been in Eagle Rock. Can you say Compton what what? But I'm happy to report we're all alive and will continue to follow the truck-just at other locations and not at Eagle Rock for safety reasons. No wonder why there were so many cop cars....So onto the ice!

Here are the most popular flavors at Get Shaved. I'd recommend trying these if you are gonna try them. Left is strawberry & Banana Shave Ice over Vanilla Ice Cream topped with Sweetened Condensed Milk. It's called Monkey Brains. It was delicious! Melted in your mouth! I really liked how they used condensed milk because a lot of non-asian desserts don't use it. Right is another delicious favorite. It's a Root Beer Float also topped with sweetened condensed milk. They have 4 different sizes and even the biggest size is under $4! What a steal. And it's even a show just watching the guy pack all the ice into the little cup. Trust me-you are getting a lot of ice in that thing! So as you can tell, I took my cousins back to Get Shaved a day later and we decided to try some other flavors. At first one of my cousins said she wouldn't eat any because she had just gotten her wisdom teeth taken out that morning and she still had cotton balls in her mouth. But one she took a bite of Get Shaved, she managed to eat it! It's a miracle!

Left is the Monkey Brains again, Center is the Island Breeze & Right is the Passion Nut. The Island Breeze is Mango flavored with Coconut & Guava Shaved Ice over Vanilla Ice Cream and the Passion Nut is Passion Fruit, Coconut and Melona over Vanilla Ice Cream. There's a bunch of other combination choices and if you can't find something you like, you can create it! My favorite is still the Monkey Brains though and Root Bear float. I think the condensed milk just does it for me. You can also add red beans and ling he mu powder to it! And here's the trick. Check their website and get to the location before they are supposed to be there. Or else, you'll be stuck in an hour long line!

And while we were getting shaved ice, my cousin mentioned she never had anything from the Kogi Taco Truck. So... of course we waited in line for food and left the swollen cousin in the car. We got Korean Tacos and Korean Sliders. I still think Kogi is overrated and they seriously need to do something about their lines. To see what I ate from them last time & an even better taco truck with no lines click here.

And then for the first day of truck chasing, we decided to celebrate our shaved ice victory by doing okonomiyaki at Gaja. Though my BFF Weheb looks pro here, we failed. We ended up ordering an monjayaki--essentially a liquid version of okonomiyaki and that was way too difficult to cook on our own. Click here to see my last visit here when we didn't fail. The pancake on the right looks so good because the kitchen made it for us.

I am so lucky to live in LA because there are a bunch of really popular food trucks. I have a list of 3 so far that I need to try so I'm hoping to be able to try those soon. As for now, I'm content in trying to chase down Get Shaved at least once a week. My advice is to skip the Kogi truck. There's a bunch of resturants that do the whole Korean taco thing so go to one of those instead-but GET SHAVED! Happy Eatings!

Banchan Mania!

Soowon Galbi Korean BBQ at 856 Vermont Ave. Los Angeles, 9005

So the other day I was trying to decide where to have lunch with my friend who I have not seen in awhile. He's from New Jersey and is currently finishing up school at LMU.

Me: Uh... so how does Korean BBQ sound?

Matt (friend from NJ): Well... I love Korean food but I haven't really had really authentic Korean food since 1) I moved to LA and 2) since I lived in New Jersey.

Me: Are you serious? Have you been living in a box your whole life?

So it was established! K-town was gonna be our stop obviously. Where else would you go for Korean food? I even brought along my Korean friend Heidi, who was craving some home food. I chose Soowon Galbi Korean BBQ and by the way... everyone loved it. *pat on the back* So my friend Matt is the typical white guy that loves Asian food, but just more adventurous. I love it! I sat down and started explaining what we could order off the menu. He automatically pointed to beef testicles and beef tongue! Awesome! But yeah we said he should stick to the basics for his first true Korean BBQ experience. I liked his attitude though!

And the banchan (side dishes) starts arriving.... Matt was so intrigued that this big salad was only a side dish. He thought this was what we ordered to eat. haha silly...

Okay so when they were finally done bringing out all the side dishes, I have to admit I was even surprised how many they brought out! Awesome! Then we started thinking that we ordered way too much food. We ordered 2 whole combinations. Uh oh... we're gonna have way to much food left over right? Wrong!

Combo 1 came with bulgogi (the beef with no bones) and also...

Naeng Myun. We ordered the one on the right but they accidentally brought out the soup one instead so they ended up switching it for us. The soup broth for the one on the right came into a cup. Cool!

We were already starting to get full off all the side dishes and then the waitress brought out our box of meat. Crap!

We had chicken, beef brisket, and pork's belly in the lunch combo we ordered. The waitresses cooked everything for us. A waiter was kept suggesting different ways to eat the meat to Matt since I don't think he's ever met someone who hasn't had real Korean BBQ before. He kept asking him what he thought of everything. We grilled our kimchi too! Rest assured, we finished everything! 

All 3 of us loved this place. Everyone was so friendly. There was 1 lady who didn't speak very good English but hey, neither do I according to my family so it's all good. P.S. my friend Matt already established he would be coming back very soon. I did my job.


Happy Eatings!

Taco Trucks! Mexican & Korean style!

Picture of Arturo's Taco Truck lcoated at Bellevue Drive and Fair Oaks Ave in Pasadena, 91105

If you haven't noticed by now, I do not discriminate. Good food is good food. So when I was told there was an amazing Taco Truck in Pasadena called Arturo's Taco Truck I knew I had to go. So there's been this whole Food Truck Mania in Los Angeles this past year mainly because of the infamous Koji Taco Truck, which I will talk about as well below. Side note, there's even a bahn mi (Vietnamese sandwich) Truck that was started by UCLA students, which I've yet to try. Side side note, my dinner tonight is bahn mi. Yum!

Jeff & I got the Al Pastor & the Busche tacos. They were amazing. These pictures are making me salivate as I'm writing this. I definitely liked this place way more than Kogi. Okay so onto the Kogi Taco Truck...

What to say? They definitely have a really good PR Team. They got onto the whole Twitter bandwagon to let everyone know where they are and when. Are they good? Yes. Are they great? Meh... maybe. But are they worth the long wait? No. Did I still wait like an idiot since I've followed it about 3 times in the past year? Yes. Don't judge me. I may be a hypocrite but I like food. Deal with it.

Here is their burrito. Not worth it. Their tacos are way better. They're not bad. Just a waste of stomach space. If you're trying to save moolah though, this will fill you up.

Yum. Kogi's pork tacos.

Kogi also has daily specials where they have random dishes the chef wants to try out for the night. That changes day to day. As for the Mexican vs. Korean tacos debate, I think Arturo's wins hands down. There's never a line. They don't drive off to another location and make you check twitter to see when they will arrive. Their tacos are amazing. I'd venture to say best I've ever had. I want to take my mom here but she doesn't go out past 6 because it's too dark. ARTURO'S, te amo!

Happy Eatings!