Kimbab Jeonkuk

Around where we live there are numerous Korean stores, markets, and restaurants. There are a few on every corner, it’s really hard to decide which ones to visit. One of our favorites is Kimbab Jeonkuk, which can be hard to find because the restaurant actually doesn’t have an English sign, just Korean. It’s located in a mini-mall on North Road, behind the Santorini Greek Restaurant on the corner of North Road and Lougheed. This place specializes in Korean rolls (maki-like with usually cooked assorted filling and flavoured with sesame oil), and cold noodles. The restaurant itself is quite small and utilitarian, with simple tables and chairs for about 30 people. Everytime we’ve been there, it’s full of Koreans, so it’s probably pretty authentic.

We’ve eaten there numerous times before, after recommendation from our friend Ana, and one of my favorite things they have is that instead of giving each table a kettle of tea, they give a kettle of beef broth. I love this—the broth is savory and warm and delicious. However, this time we went we didn’t get the broth, I suppose because it was kind of hot out. We ordered what we usually get, cold noodles and a kimbab. They have 3 kinds of cold noodle: plain, spicy and I think a seafood one (?). This time our choice was the spicy cold noodle, with kimchi kimbab. Note about the menu—most of the menu is in both Korean and English, but for some reason the cold noodle part is only in Korean. The servers are pretty nice, though sometimes the English is limited, but you can ask them if you have questions about the menu.

The kimchi kimbab arrived first. We’ve ordered this before, but the kimchi is a little different this time—it was a lot sweeter. I’m not such a fan of sweet and savory, so I didn’t like this too much. We were also given a small plate of yellow turnip pickles as a side dish, but again, I didn’t eat this because it was too sweet for me.

The spicy cold noodles consisted of chewy clear noodles, some cold beef broth, Korean chili paste, slices of pork, boiled egg, cucumbers, sesame oil, and thin slices of pickled turnip. Once you stir it up the dish becomes an impressive red. It has great flavor and is very aromatic, and gives a nice heat to the tongue.

We like this restaurant—it has simple food and décor, but you can tell that a lot of love went into the dishes.