Sorry, Glenview.

My last visit was in May, too, with the panchan bar.

I was at the Glenview cafe a few weeks ago and they said "no more banchan"

In case anyone missed it, Joong Boo on Kimball was closed briefly by the City last week. Per blockclubchicago.org:

at blockclubchicago.org, Mina Bloom wrote:Fans of Joong Boo were startled to find a big green “License Suspended” sign affixed to the beloved Asian market’s window Thursday.

But it was only up for a little more than a day.

The market at 3333 N. Kimball Ave. reopened at about noon Friday. A manager there, who declined to be named, said plumbing issues forced the closure.

“Our water tank was giving us problems — it was nothing to do with food,” the manager told Block Club.

But an inspection report provided by the city’s Department of Public Health shows that some packaged squid sold at Joong Boo was contaminated with salmonella.

The market was inspected following a complaint from the public, according to the report. “Managers [sic] was not aware of the complaint. Establishment buys the frozen squid from reputable company. Panama squid from Quirch Foods… Squid are frozen and packaged for sale.”

Joong Boo was also cited for a lack of hot water throughout the store, the report said.

Don’t Freak Out: Joong Boo Market Is Open Again After Brief Shutdown

=R=

Joong Boo Glenview:

Last Friday, had an opportunity to check this place out again. WOW. WOW.
The banchan set ups are indeed, gone. Counterlady confirmed, gone, not coming back. They've been replaced with other condiments, two hot sauces, something that looked like a relish of sorts (no idea, sorry.) BUT....

From my last visit, which I thoroughly enjoyed, it felt they've upped their game.
Our Trial:
On sale so we had to try: Spicy Tofu Soup. $6.50. Absolute bargain! There was shrimp and mussels or oysters in it too! It was fantastic. Not very "spicy" just kinda "warm with pepper heat." It came with pickles, kimchi, crumbled seaweed, steamed rice, and a whole small fried fish (think medium sardine sized - maybe 6 decent bites to it.) BARGAIN ALERT!!!!

Chicken wings were a touch sweeter than I remembered, but still fantastic.

From the dumpling counter, we got an order of the pork dumplings which were big and round. I remember them being standard gyoza shaped crescents before, and much smaller (?) I also remember them not having much flavor - not BAD, but just kinda ho-hum. These were big, juicy, porky and garlicky. I loved these things. We also got an order of the fish cake and rice noodle in the spicy red pasty sauce. At 3.99, the portion could feed two people, easily, but the flavor was kinda one-note. It was a great addition to a meal though, imo.

Only two of us, so we were already at overkill - only made it through half of everything (except we demolished those dumplings, and I ordered more to take home for the fam...They were damn good.)

Difficult to overstate the vastness of the Joong Boo Glenview second floor cafeteria space seating area.




1st floor grocery large and well stocked.




I only tried one item, shrimp and pork dumplings from the dumpling stand. A bit over steamed and slightly blah, though tasty once I applied sauce and gochugaru from condiment area.



How does Joong Boo Glenview compare to H-Mart Niles, favorably though edge goes to Niles H-Mart as its larger with more in-house dining options. Plus I've been digging on Jajangmyeon from KyoDong Noodle in H-Mart Niles food court and kimbap from the prepared section.

G Wiv wrote:I only tried one item, shrimp and pork dumplings from the dumpling stand. A bit over steamed and slightly blah, though tasty once I applied sauce and gochugaru from condiment area.

Those shrimp dumplings always look good, but just don't deliver. I prefer pretty much all the rest of the dumpling types (but not a big fan of the kimchi ones, surprisingly)

G Wiv wrote:How does Joong Boo Glenview compare to H-Mart Niles, favorably though edge goes to Niles H-Mart as its larger with more in-house dining options. Plus I've been digging on Jajangmyeon from KyoDong Noodle in H-Mart Niles food court and kimbap from the prepared section.

Assi Plaza provides a number of nice booths -- I particularly like the one that does tonkatsu (the curry version is quite nice). The biggest advantage of Joong Boo is the dumplings. Often I'm looking for a quick, cheap, small meal/snack, and the price point of most of the items at Assi, H-Mart, and the Joong Boo Snack stand are all $8-12 and a full meal that could serve as dinner. Two of the King dumplings at Joong Boo for $5 and I'm good to go.

JoelF wrote:

G Wiv wrote:I only tried one item, shrimp and pork dumplings from the dumpling stand. A bit over steamed and slightly blah, though tasty once I applied sauce and gochugaru from condiment area.

Those shrimp dumplings always look good, but just don't deliver. I prefer pretty much all the rest of the dumpling types (but not a big fan of the kimchi ones, surprisingly

At the Kedzie location, where there is quite a bit of turn-over (and sometimes even a wait while the dumplings finish steaming), the small Pork & Shrimp dumplings are usually terrific and definitely the best item available . . .


Pork & Shrimp Dumplings at Joong Boo on Kedzie

And at $6.00 for 5 dumplings, it's a very nice price. A little chili oil, a little soy sauce and you're good to go.

=R=

Are those dumplings from the outside booth or inside restaurant?

Jazzfood wrote:Are those dumplings from the outside booth or inside restaurant?

The outside booth.

=R=

I was planning to make some Korean for dinner and needed some ingredients. Had I still been in Glenview it wouldn’t of been a problem but that was last month.

Also after visiting their grocery cafe up north I checked and sure enough there was a cafe at the Chicago location.

Knowing they are often heavy on the soups and My Brides lack of preference I was hoping they had the seebee chicken. Yup! We also grabbed a dumpling on the way in.


The dumpling was pork and vegetable and I was expecting the purple colored ones I have seen posted but ours was plain white (My Bride grabbed it while I was parking).


On our departure I peeked in the outside stand window and saw the purple ones?

The dumpling was tasty but I couldn’t help but to draw a comparison to a Runza which is not a favorite of My Bride.

The chicken was also very good! seebee’s comments were playing through my head “not too spicy at all and not too sweet”. Seemed a bit sweet and there was a nice crunch here and there from the frying. Maybe they could of been kicked up a notch with the chili powder on the table?


Eating them counter temperature made me wish for Great Seas fresh cooked.

All in all a nice visit! My Bride loves to people watch and there was no shortage of that.

Panther in the Den wrote:...
The dumpling was pork and vegetable and I was expecting the purple colored ones I have seen posted but ours was plain white (My Bride grabbed it while I was parking).

12730E9C-A60A-4946-B9ED-363CAC357567.jpeg

On our departure I peeked in the outside stand window and saw the purple ones?

....

The purple ones are the Back Rice filled with Redbean. The white ones are the Pork and vegetable or the Kimchi w/pork.

Had the rare opportunity to stop by the Kimball location "Snack Shop" on a weekday for lunch (it's always too crowded for me to even consider when I'm there on a weekend). I had the #22, sul-long-tang, described as "beef & honeycomb soup with rice, kimchi, and veg". I was prepared for the honeycomb tripe based on that name, but was pleasantly surprised that I believe the sliced beef was actually sliced beef tongue!

The soup itself is oxtail bone broth, very pale, and pretty bland (I think deliberately so). There are condiments including a salt shaker, soy sauce, rice vinegar, and korean red pepper flakes available on the table to dress the soup to your desire. The accompanying veggies were a salted seaweed, two types of kimchi (regular cabbage kimchi and a radish kimchi), and a kimchi-style zucchini/red bell pepper blend. Overall, a great lunch for $10 (+tax), though since I'm used to the very savory, umami, and sodium-laden Korean soups (I like salt) like the spicy tofu soup - I was hoping the broth would have more of a punch. Even dressing with the condiments on the table (lots of the red pepper flake) and accompanying each mouthful with the salted seaweed and kimchi, I was missing the big bold flavors I was hoping for. But still a great value and if you can get in before the crowds (11:30am on a Monday offered at least 3-4 seats for solo diners), it's a great lunch option!

bluepig wrote:#22, sul-long-tang
...
The soup itself is oxtail bone broth, very pale, and pretty bland (I think deliberately so).

Yes, absolutely, deliberately so. Love Joong Boo both cafe/store, prefer Han Bat for So Lun Tang. Was just there a few days ago for a mix of tongue and tendon. Easy parking, no jostling with other customers, delicious, with a bonus of an over the top grouchy Korean grandmother doing the work of three.



So Lun Tang, count me a fan!

Han Bat Restaurant
2723 W Lawrence Ave
Chicago, IL 60625
773-271-8640

G Wiv wrote:with a bonus of an over the top grouchy Korean grandmother doing the work of three.

Did you chat it up with the grouchy grandma ?

Al Ehrhardt wrote:

G Wiv wrote:with a bonus of an over the top grouchy Korean grandmother doing the work of three.

Did you chat it up with the grouchy grandma ?

Yeah, did she give you some VIP-Foodie scolding?

=R=

Al Ehrhardt wrote:Did you chat it up with the grouchy grandma ?

Yes, we are meeting next week for barley tea and Korean soaps.

ronnie_suburban wrote:Yeah, did she give you some VIP-Foodie scolding?

A gentleman does not yell and tell.

Love the original Chicago location, ever since they started selling the lollipop chicken I hardly ever go to Great Seas anymore. I don't really care for the fresh dumpling stand outside, they always smell so yeasty to me, I like that smell in sourdough bread but in asian style dumplings a strong yeast smell seems off to me. Is that smell normal for dumpling shops?
Also tried the Glenview location food court. IMO the food tastes different, lollipop wings have a different tasting sauce, which is not as good as the Chicago one.

The one thing I don't like about the Chicago location is when they run out of wings from the food counter indoors and you buy it from the steamed bun stall outside the wings do not taste fresh. They have them sitting in a hot warming box all day and as a result have a different taste/texture than when fresh out the fryer like sold at inside food stall. They are basically not crunchy anymore and dont have a fresh taste to them if the chicken wings are bought from the mandu steamed bun vendor outside.

Also as a note they raised the price of Wang Mandoo buns to $3/each (from $2.50) at the Chicago location.

Uther wrote:Love the original Chicago location, ever since they started selling the lollipop chicken I hardly ever go to Great Seas anymore. I don't really care for the fresh dumpling stand outside, they always smell so yeasty to me, I like that smell in sourdough bread but in asian style dumplings a strong yeast smell seems off to me. Is that smell normal for dumpling shops?
Also tried the Glenview location food court. IMO the food tastes different, lollipop wings have a different tasting sauce, which is not as good as the Chicago one.

Yeast in dumpling dough? Why?

Kman wrote:

Uther wrote:Love the original Chicago location, ever since they started selling the lollipop chicken I hardly ever go to Great Seas anymore. I don't really care for the fresh dumpling stand outside, they always smell so yeasty to me, I like that smell in sourdough bread but in asian style dumplings a strong yeast smell seems off to me. Is that smell normal for dumpling shops?
Also tried the Glenview location food court. IMO the food tastes different, lollipop wings have a different tasting sauce, which is not as good as the Chicago one.

Yeast in dumpling dough? Why?

Korean wang mandu uses a similar dough to baos, and they both use yeast.

The dumpling stand outside the Chicago location, when they're cooking buns, has this strong sourdough/yeast odor. The fresh baked buns I think retain some of that odor but over time it dissipates. I haven't really smelled that odor with other buns like this so it was a little off-putting to me although the buns taste fine.

Visited for the first time last weekend. Never made it upstairs to the café, as there were enough free samples on the ground floor to keep me busy.

Noticed that, while they may not have a panchan bar, they had a lot of panchan items prepackaged in the refrigerated section. Picked up some spicy cucumbers.

At this moment, I'm enjoying bulgogee that they were sampling on the ground floor -- amusingly, to me, labeled as seasoned ribeye with "bulgogee" as a subtitle. It was mighty tasty at the store -- and just cooked for a few seconds in a frying pan, it is just as delightful now. Nice bonus: the price was reduced by $2/lb -- so I'm set for a while.

Plus baby bok choy was on sale. As were several other veg.

For me, the great benefit of having Joong Boo in Glenview is that I live in Palatine, and while this is not next door, it is a lot closer than the other places I love. (Though not so much closer that I wouldn't continue on if I hadn't had such a positive experience.) A bit more crowded than Super H Mart, but good prices -- and closer.

Cynthia wrote:At this moment, I'm enjoying bulgogee that they were sampling on the ground floor -- amusingly, to me, labeled as seasoned ribeye with "bulgogee" as a subtitle. It was mighty tasty at the store -- and just cooked for a few seconds in a frying pan, it is just as delightful now. Nice bonus: the price was reduced by $2/lb -- so I'm set for a while.

The demo ladies at H-Mart gave me a great tip related to cooking bulgogee in a frying pan: you cook it until the water evaporates enough for the sugars to caramelize. Instead of a limp brown beef, it looks more robust deep color and (I think) better flavor.

I do cook this in a non-stick pan to keep the clean up less of a nightmare.

Regards,
Cathy2

There’s some talk upthread about the expanded dumpling selection at Joong Boo. Well you can actually get a sampler platter of all four kinds (at least at the Kimball store) for the low price of $10!



First of all, this is a more than reasonable portion size for two people. Second, the fillings for the small thin skin dumplings are the same as those in the big steamed buns. So the only difference is in the thin wrapper which had a nice stretchy al dente texture in my order. Nice job not over steaming these.
Pork dumpling

Kimchee dumpling


I'm a big fan of the kimchee steamed bun so the kimchee dumpling with the same filling was my favorite. The pork was not bad and the shrimp was a bit limp so kind of a miss. I guess that’s what happens when shellfish sits in the steamer too long. On the other hand, the large white shrimp I bought in the seafood section cooked up plump, crunchy and flavorful at home – really excellent.