First time Sushi/Korean restaurant visit what should I have?!
Answers: I'm heading to The Hop House in Dublin tomorrow night, it'll be my first expereince of Sushi and Korean food, what can I expect and can you recommend any particular dishes, I am a meat eater.
Try katsu Curry
Fried chicken in a mild curry sauce with white steamed rice.
Sushi: Tempura Shrimp rolls, spicy tuna rolls and eel rolls.
Food: Bul-go-gi (phonetic) which is beef in a spicy sauce or teriyaki chicken.
Meat eater?
Definitely Bulgogi. (Literally fire-meat or bbq meat - beef).
It's so tastey and almost all of my western friends would list this as their favourite korean food - nobody hates it.
Another really popular dish with my western friends is Bibimpab - A large bowl filled with vegetables, rich and some meat (usually beef).
Dolsot Bibimpab is the same meal served in a hot stone bowl and is definitely recommended.
Enjoy!
For sushi I would recommend the basic tuna or salmon. Ebi (prawn) is my personal favourite.
Korean food , you can try :
- Bulgogi ( grilled marinated beef )
- Gal Bi ( grill beef short Ribs )
- Dae Ji Gal Bi ( spicy grilled pork ribs )
- Yook Gee Jang ( spicy beef & scalion soup ) -- you must like spicy with this food
- Jap Chae ( beef and vegetable noodle )
- and so many more ..
* If you try meat in korean food , they always come with vegetable , you just wrab the meat with the veggie ..
oohh - so good !!
they are so delicious .. !!
If you're slightly scared of sushi, try the veggie stuff first. The best one is inari, which is rice inside a sweet-ish marinated tofu, really nice. Tamago is like omelette. There's usually something with avocado, or Japanese pickles. If you have something like california roll, it's usually got something like tuna & avocado inside, so you don't always have to jump headfirst into eating raw fish :-)
It's all good, except fish roe. Which is evil in any format.
Beef or chicken satay.
Bulgogi. But Bulgogi is sizzling so it's best not to wear a light-coloured shirt.
Otherwise, you may choose to get yookgaejjang, which is meat soup, usually chicken or beef. But it's really not easy to find good yookgaejjang.
Try the pancakes too if they do serve them cuz they're really good!
I'm generally reluctant to order sushi at a restaurant that doesn't specialize in sushi (or Japanese food in general), just because I think that a mixed restaurant won't devote as much attention to it. Having said that, if you're a sushi newbie, start with makizushi (rolls). You can eat them easily with your fingers or chopsticks, and they have a smaller amount of fish in them than nigiri (slices of fish on top of rice). Once you decide you like the taste, and I guarantee you will, move on to the nigiri.
As for specific fish, tuna and salmon are always very popular, as are shrimp and eel. Squid and octopus are pretty rubbery, and I don't think they work well as sushi, but a lot of people like them as well. And, of course, as others have already mentioned, you could do the vegetarian route and go with cucumbers, avocadoes, and egg.
Get the pork belly! It's basically thick slices of bacon that you cook on the grill. Let it get good and crispy. They'll give you a dipping sauce of salt, pepper and sesame oil. Eat it with or without the lettuce. It is freaking delicious. Also, see if they have a scallion salad.
Other good Korean staples are Bulgogi (marinated beef, cooked onthe grill), BiBimBop (a rice dish with veggies, meat, egg), oyster pancake.