Stumbled upon this place when my family was on Toronto vacation. If you had to define "hole-in-a-wall," this place would represent. The whole place is set up with one row of people to sit along the bar under the wall of mirror, and just enough space for one person to squeeze behind the row of people sitting down towards the counter. There were, I think, 5 seats at the bar.
When my family of three walked in, there were nobody, and the described setup completely threw us off, I have to admit. Menus are simple enough, and all written on the wall so you just have to make you choice. This place is set up -- from the layout to the menu choices -- like what's called a "boonshik" (snack) joint. Not meant for a sit-down dining experience, but traditionally more for young students to stop by and have a quick snack meal. Hence kimbap (Korean version of seaweed rolls), ddukbokki (spicy rice cake), oden (fish cake & soup), ddukgook (rice cake soup) etc...
We shared all of the above. Could it have been the surprising first impression of the place, leading to absolute low expectations? Could it have been the cold whether we were in that numbed our senses?
They *all* tasted like exactly what they were supposed to taste like.
I know it's a weird statement to make, I know. I'm sure some of you will be wondering why this is such a big deal, and might even sound stupid for me to state. But the truth is, it is not easy to find a restaurant that can pull off the true grit of all aforementioned food. The owner knew exactly what she was doing when she prepped all of those staple traditional Korean snack-meals. Dare I say it was one of the best anyone has ever come to mimicking the comfort level of Korea's street-level vendors in all of the places I've tried in North America.
What you have to understand is that these dishes are meant to be street-level snacks. They're supposed to be your street taco, street jerk chicken, street samosa, street pierogi, festival okonomiyaki, street poutine.. you get the point. They don't require crazy quality or quantity ingredients to cook up. But what they can and *should* have, is a very distinct taste that can only come from knowing how they were originally prepped back-in-the-days. And these days, I definitely fall under the category of someone who should know what they're supposed to taste like. (a.k.a. old enough to know the street food of Korea)
A nice young man came to sit down and eat next to us halfway through our meal. He overheard my conversation with the owner about how her food tasted legit, apologized first for eavesdropping, then proceeded to tell us he's originally from the area, now visiting from NYC and this is one of his go-to spots. The owner was very modest about it, but this young man also confirmed it's hard to find this level of Korean comfort in the big Apple either.
I generally save my Yelp reviews for at least the second visit. That's why I only have 4 stars here. I look forward to re-visiting the second time and confirming consistency so I can bump my rating up to 5. read more