Visiting for a Monday lunch at around 1PM, we had no idea Horang would be that popular. At the…read moretime, the place was completely full and we were advised there would be a 30 minute wait for bar seating. We wandered over to the attached Horang Market, a little grocery store filled with Korean goods, to browse while waiting. In our case, we were lucky to be at the tail end of the lunch rush. It actually took only 15 minutes and we managed to get a table!
Korean Fried Chicken, Yangyum Glaze, Half ($21) - A half order of the fried chicken consists of eight pieces. I thought going into the restaurant it would be only four pieces and was planning to order another dish as well, but thankfully I asked the waitress and she explained everything. As a surprise, we actually got nine pieces of chicken since two pieces had stuck together!
The pieces are all boneless thighs, with the dark meat allowing the meat to remain juicy through the frying process. It's kept skin on, and the skin is rendered out excellently. They simply salt and pepper the skin, then dip into the batter. The fried coating is applied evenly, resulting in a consistent bite that remains somewhat crisp even through being dipped in the yangnyeom glaze. I'd say the crispness isn't as robust as other KFCs I've eaten, but it's still pleasing nonetheless.
The sauce is of course the draw. It's extremely viscous, basically to the consistency of caramel due to the amount of sugar added. It's slightly funky with a faint heat that's barely felt in the mouth.
The dish comes with one dipping sauce that isn't required at all given how flavorful the chicken is. We got the garlic aioli anyways, which is surprisingly strong in garlic flavor with the mayo completely eliminating the garlic pungency. It's actually much stronger than a toum that we had from a Middle-Eastern place the day before. (5/5)
Charred Daeji Galbi Soban ($23) - This order comes with a variety of different banchan:
Mandu - Two pieces. I'm not sure if these are made in house, but I'm leaning towards these being commercial. They have very uniformly thin wrappers housing a mix of savory and very salty ground pork, mushrooms, and vermicelli noodles. The wrappers are dried out and kind of leathery in chew. They are served in a sauce that I think is a combination of vinegar, soy sauce, and sugar, making it sweet, tangy, savory, and salty. I think they precook these and let them sit in an open warmer, which explains why they are so dry.
Japchae - The japchae is very salty like too much soy sauce was added, yet also feels very dry and missing the fragrant and oily sesame sheen. The noodles feel undercooked in some portions, being very firm, different from the bouncy texture I normally associate with sweet potato noodles. This isn't a very good japchae.
Napa Denjang Soup - Includes napa and tofu. Pretty standard miso taste, not particularly strong or funky.
Prawn Twigim - Two pieces. Tender, sweet shrimp, covered with tempura batter and fried. This gives a light crisp coating. They add the same soy/vinegar dipping sauce on the bottom of the serving container, soggifying the ends of the tempura a bit.
Kimbap - Two pieces. They are filled with plenty of chopped carrot, a piece of pickled daikon, some avocado and tofu skin in rice and seaweed. Simple, but fresh and tasty.
Salad - Greens in a very sweet and citrusy dressing. Lightly dressed, no dressing pools on the bottom.
The main dish includes perfectly cooked medium grain rice with great texture and mouthfeel. On top, they have a couple pieces of charred galbi with a thick sweet sauce glazed on top. The taste of the char actually penetrates into the rice, creating a flavorful bite. The galbi is fatty, tender, not too chewy and generally tastes quite nice especially due to the glaze. (3/5)
I really enjoyed the Korean fried chicken served at Horang. For the Charred Daeji Galbi Soban, while the main dish was good, I found the banchan to only be subpar to average. Then again, I wasn't expecting to find good Korean food in Nanaimo in the first place, so it was still a pleasant surprise.
Washrooms - Three rooms, one for men, one for women, last one accessible.
