Korean food in Champaign-Urbana (etiquette?)

i love Korean food, so i'm immensely glad that there are a few Korean restaurants in Champaign-Urbana. However, i continue to find myself in this strange situation when i order from a couple of the restaurants. You see, thanks to my time in Chicago, i am now physically addicted to kimbop (among other Korean delicacies). Say what you will about this lowly picnic food, i could probably eat it everyday with a silly smile on my face. There is something humbly sublime about the mixture of rice, egg, spinach, daikon, and seaweed. As i professed to the cashier at the Korean market (Green Onion) the other day, it is the perfect food.

In the summer of 2005 & early 2006, i used to order kimbop to go from Dorca's on Green Street. However, since early 2006, i haven't been successful doing this. i see the dish on the menu, ask for it, and am told "not today." This has happened many times, on various days, & every time, i'm too embarrassed to ask when i can order it. Because, really, how does a full-service Korean restaurant not have the materials for kimbop? All the ingredients appear in other dishes one can order. If they simply don't want to make it, why not remove it from the menu?

Last week, a Korean-American friend & i were craving kimbop. We were denied kimbop at Dorca's, so we went to Woori Jib & had the same experience. Kimbop was there on the menu, but upon ordering it, we were told they didn't have it. ?? My friend asked if they usually have it, and the man smiled, shaking his head no (though i'm not positive that he understood what she was asking).

What are we doing wrong? Is there a secret code? It's been over a year since i got any kimbop in Champaign-Urbana; i can't keep going to Chicago for it (plus, try as i might, there's no way to transport it without making the whole car smell like kimbop). Green Onion makes it in the morning, but i do prefer for the rolls to be made fresh & to order (i order without beef). They also sell out fairly quickly.

(Yes, i have tried to make it-- it was good, but a lot of work for just one person eating it! Plus, i sort of like the hot egg on the other ingredients... but i'm inexperienced at getting everything in the roll quickly enough, so it was a little tepid by the time all the rolls were ready to eat. Sometime my friend & i will make it though, as another pair of hands would be helpful. i just want a quick fix sometimes, you know?)

Places mentioned:

Green Onion Market
2020 S Neil St
Champaign, IL
(217) 359-5370

Dorcas Korean Restaurant
403 E Green St
Champaign, IL
(217) 337-7726

Woori Jib Restaurant
710 S 6th St
Champaign, IL
(217) 384-8282

Is it possible that the kitchens at these places currently don't have someone who's skilled enough with rolling it up?

Just a thought.

Best,
Michael

eatchicago wrote:Is it possible that the kitchens at these places currently don't have someone who's skilled enough with rolling it up?

Just a thought.

Best,
Michael

That's possible-- although surprising to me.

i did think that the size of the kimbop i used to get from Dorcas was rather odd-- the rolls were huge. They resembled a burrito from Chipotle. There was no hope of getting a whole piece in your mouth, or even half a piece. i never minded, as i would stuff my face with kimbop in the privacy of my own apartment, but it did seem odd to me. i thought that kimbop was supposed to be fast food (i.e. each piece should fit neatly in the mouth).

Eat it as a handroll. A lot less work. Just assemble your ingredients, take a square of seasoned seaweed (Korean-style), spread some rice, add your ingredients and roll into a small cone.

We seldom ever make maki (as you'd get a restaurant) at home, but eat handrolls/sushi/sashimi almost twice a week certain "seasons." That's what most Japanese households do in Japan.

You could adapt this for your craving for kimbop.

Keep the extra ingredients (what you don't eat) separate in tupperware/rubbermaid/gladware, and eat kimbop anytime.

Green Onion on Neil sells it to go. I've never ordered it in a resraurant, it's more the sort of thing you buy on the fly to take with.

Have you tried B Won next door to the Green Onion?

M_Six wrote:Have you tried B Won next door to the Green Onion?

No, but we are thinking of going there tomorrow! Do you know if they have kimbop on the menu? i'm very curious about the place... aside from kimbop, i'm interested in their soup/stew/hotpot selection (for the colder months, naturally).

I don't know if B Won has kim bop but I suppose you could call them. I've enjoyed their raw crab in spicy sauce, some kind of soup with kim chi and tuna, and cold noodles with raw fish (sorry I don't remember the korean names).

I had a stew with octopus and short ribs that was cooked at the table by an indifferent teenage waitron and I wouldn't say that it was prepared with love. But the owner and other employees are very nice. I'm stuck on the raw crab dish and whenever I eat there the owner seems amused by how messy I get. They now put a stack of napkins on the table when I sit down. But I ask you, how do you eat raw crab in the shell in spicy sauce without getting a little on your hands?

comradelaura wrote: ...that was cooked at the table by an indifferent teenage waitron and I wouldn't say that it was prepared with love.

That was our experience, too. I wonder why they even bother. Also, if you order more than one cooked-at-the-table meal, they cook them one at a time, so someone ends up with their meal growing cold while the other waits for their meal to be finished. Keep that in mind if you go with a larger group and all order tableside prep meals.

aletheis,

sorry to hear your current crack food is hard to obtain in C-U. i'd have to say it's mostly because kimbap is considered a snack food and not ordered as part of a meal on a regular basis. restaurants don't serve kimbap here on the west coast. supermarkets make kimbap. korean mall food courts sell kimbap.

perhaps they don't remove the item from the menu because not enough clientele orders the item to bother them. except you

while Jay K's obviously correct in advising you to go home-made, i personally feel a hand rolled kimbap would be totally out of wack, fun wise.

g'luck sir. move to the east/west coast after graduation?

TonyC wrote:aletheis,

sorry to hear your current crack food is hard to obtain in C-U. i'd have to say it's mostly because kimbap is considered a snack food and not ordered as part of a meal on a regular basis. restaurants don't serve kimbap here on the west coast. supermarkets make kimbap. korean mall food courts sell kimbap.

perhaps they don't remove the item from the menu because not enough clientele orders the item to bother them. except you

while Jay K's obviously correct in advising you to go home-made, i personally feel a hand rolled kimbap would be totally out of wack, fun wise.

g'luck sir. move to the east/west coast after graduation?

(sorry, forgot about this post!)

You're right. In Chicago i never ordered kimbop at a restaurant-- i would pick it up at Clark Market, Chicago Food Corp, or in a pinch, at one of the University of Chicago coffee shops (Seoul Corea sells food at some of them).

The problem is that C-U has only one store (Green Onion) that sells it, they only make it once a day, and they often run out early. It's a sad world down here for lazy kimbop lovers. What i need is a loving Korean grandmother! [i will say that i am shameless and mention kimbop all the time to the 2 Korean students in my class, as well as to the older Korean woman in my department.... i'm like a junkie!]

A friend & i made it a couple weeks ago after making the rounds to all the Korean places in the area & being denied the Crack. It took awhile, but the rolls were darn good. i still wish i could get it on the fly, though. Lately life has been so exhausting that even the tamest of kitchen messes seems overwhelming.

Thanks to all for your insight!