Choon Ha Choo Dong Korean Restaurant

One evening, we met a few friends for a Korean dinner. Since a couple of our friends (who recommended this place) were Korean, we left most of the ordering to them. The restaurant is on Broadway, near Main St., where there used to be another Korean restaurant. Anyway, the space itself is a little hard to find, since the restaurant is actually located up a dark set of stairs. The interior is similar to many other Korean places: lots of wood, with many booths and semi-private 'rooms'.

We ordered the BBQ combo ($49.00), which came with rice cake and dumpling soup, chapchae, sashimi, assorted marinated meats, and dumplings. There was a vegetarian amongst our group, so we also ordered vegetarian bibimbap as well (alas, no picture of this). The soup arrived in a large bowl, and was very flavourful, with a delicate beef broth. There was plenty enough to share.

Ana and Kay always say that you can judge a good restaurant by the quality of their side dishes. The complimentary banchan at the restaurant was excellent. The kimchi was bracingly sour and the sprouts, potatoes and everything else was particularly tasty.

One of the best dishes that we had that night was the fried dumplings. Simply, these were the best dumplings we have had at any Korean restaurant. The outside was crispy and chewy, and the vegetarian filling was delicious.

The sashimi was good as well, though I was more excited by the other menu items.

As it often happens when I'm dining with friends, I tend to forget to take pictures. Here I only remembered after all the meat had been cooked! The meat was very well marinated and had great flavour. Nothing really beats cooking our own meat at the table.

Finally, there came a sweet rice water at the end of the meal. It was a little to sweet for me, but it was still pleasant.

We were lucky to have the inside scoop on this place. This is probably one of the better Korean restaurants in Metro Vancouver. We will definitely be back.