Cycle 4 – Item 297

29 (Tue) October 2013

Bokchoy in Oyster Sauce

2.0

at China Bob

-Oksu, Seongdong, Seoul, Republic of Korea-

with the W and DJ

China Bob is a Korean-Chinese restaurant.  Aspires to rise above the level of a typical neighborhood delivery joint, with a couple dishes on the menu that could be characterized as “progressive” for a Korean-Chinese restaurant, but the overall menu and prices, as well as the general vibe, suggest that it’s exactly a typical neighborhood delivery joint. The “Bob” is a play on the Korean word for rice/food, usually transliterated as “bap/bab” – also very progressive to use an English pun in the restaurant name, which is typically some bogus Chinese word.

On this first – and probably penultimate – visit, we ordered a few of those newfangled dishes, which were sadly disappointing.  The preparations seemed to demonstrate the chef’s utter lack of fundamental skills/understanding and/or lack of experience with such newfangled items.  Thanks for trying, but no thanks.  We’ll go back one more time to see if the traditional dishes are done any better.

The best dish of the evening, the best of the blah, was the parboiled bokchoy in oyster sauce.  For whatever reason, the vast majority of Korean-Chinese restaurants don’t offer vegetable dishes, and even the supporting veg in other dishes tend to be limited to basics like onion, carrot, bell pepper, mushrooms, canned baby corn or bamboo, maybe broccoli or bokchoy in bits and pieces.  Bokchoy is DJ’s favorite food at the moment, so he was totally psyched to get an entire plate of it.  It was okay, somewhat overcooked – like I said, a lack of fundamentals: I mean, really, how difficult is it to parboil bokchoy?  In absolute terms, a total ripoff at 18,000 won, though perhaps worth it to see my child down that much green in one sitting.

(See also GLOBAL FOOD GLOSSARY)

(See also RESTAURANTS IN KOREA)