new basement discovery

brisket kalguksu

I broke my normal routine: when I go downstairs to my workplace's basement to eat, I always go to one particular restaurant that is a mosquito-ridden hole in the wall (yes, mosquitoes even in the winter), but Friday afternoon, I broke with that tendency and visited one of several new restaurants that have popped up in the basement. I don't know this restaurant's name (it's not printed on the menu), and I neglected to take a pic of the resto's main sign (wherever it might be—I didn't see it from where I was sitting), but I sat down and ordered some brisket kalguksu (lit. "knife noodles," i.e., noodles made by using a knife to cut the flattened pasta).

Damn, it was good! That broth was spectacular, and the noodles had a magnificent, fresh-made taste and smell. Let me back up a bit: at my usual go-to restaurant, they also serve kalguksu, but the only kind they have comes with a mess of tiny clams. Flavor-wise, that's just fine. I love seafood kalguksu as well. But digging the tiny bits of clam meat out of those shells is a fucking chore you have to repeat twenty-five or thirty times, and when I saw that this new restaurant had both seafood kalguksu and brisket kalguksu, I said Hell, yes, I'm getting the brisket! No goddamn shells to pick through. And it was a good choice. The soup came out piping hot and stayed hot for most of the meal. As I said, the broth was amazing: a great combination of beefiness, fattiness, and saltiness without going overboard on any of those aspects. I have to wonder how long it took to make that broth, but I'm pretty sure that sort of thing is a trade secret. Maybe I'll try asking, anyway, the next time I go back there (which might be as soon as later this afternoon since I have to be in the office for Saturday work).

The sides were simple: a tiny dish of danmuji (sweet-pickled mu, a radish), and a tiny dish of strong, salty kimchi meant to be dunked into the broth. The strips of brisket in the soup made me think that this sort of kalguksu might be a recent Korean response to the incursion of so many Vietnamese restaurants (pretty much all Koreanized in terms of the food they sell); these places all sell pho with brisket. 

I can't say that I've ever had brisket kalguksu before, ever. It feels new. Maybe I'm wrong; maybe it's been around all this time, and I just never noticed until now. But I was happy to have the brisket, and the guy who served me didn't stint on it the way some Viet places do: some of those places give you only three or four thin, grudging strips of meat. Meanwhile, my soup bowl was full of brisket, by contrast, which makes me wonder how long this guy's business is going to last. Generosity in the restaurant biz doesn't usually lead to prosperity. Restaurant cooking is often the art of seeming generous. I'm not saying my kalguksu was like a bowl of nothing-but-brisket, but there was more than enough beef in the bowl for this not to be the usual "use the beef merely to punctuate the flavor" situation. Meat is generally used sparingly in Korean cuisine for the practical reason that it's pretty expensive, especially compared to US prices, and especially when it comes to beef in particular.

I looked at the menu while I ate, and I saw plenty of other things I'd like to try. I suspect I'm going to eat my way through this guy's menu before I move on to any of the other new basement establishments. Seriously, though, this place is amazing if that soup is any indication. I'd recommend the resto to all my readers, but most of you bastards don't live in the area. Well... your loss.