Kogii Kogii Korean Barbeque - Riverwoods

My curiosity piqued by Cathy2's recent post, I decided to take advantage of a work-from-home day and check this place out.


Kogii Kogii Korean Barbeque - 1121 Milwaukee Ave, Riverwoods


Grill
Gas-fired, cast iron.


Menu Card

There is also a menu of non-barbeque items. When you enter, you're asked whether you want the AYCE option or the regular menu. The reason for this, I'm guessing, is mostly because not all the tables are outfitted with grills and vent hoods. So one's decision seems to have more to do with logistics than anything else. Of course, I'm also guessing they don't want anyone who's not ordering barbeque sitting -- and possibly sharing -- with those who are. That makes perfect sense.

The two of us told them that we'd each order barbeque . . . plus some other items. This being our first visit, we wanted to try more than just the barbeque but from a quantity perspective, the additional items were completely unnecessary. In the end, we tried all 6 of the available meats, plus a couple of other items. But first, banchan . . .


Banchan
Fish Cake, Kimchi


Banchan
Radish


Banchan
Seaweed


Banchan
Tofu with Chile Oil


Banchan
Cucumber


Haemul Pajun (seafood pancake)
I loved that they brought it out actually sizzling on a sizzle platter. It tasted good and contained generous portions of octopus and scallion. On the downside, it suffered a bit from its ampleness, as it was pretty soft and mushy in the center. Next time, maybe I'll try the kimchi version.


Haemul Pajun (seafood pancake)
A closer look


Soon Dubu (spicy seafood tofu soup)
Bubbling hard, as it should be. But wait. Where's the egg?!


Soon Dubu (spicy seafood tofu soup)
Ah, there's the egg! I've still not found a version of this soup that compares with how it used to be made at Cho Jung back in the day but I liked this mildly spicy, flavorful take a lot and would return to Kogii Kogii just to order it.


Meats
These were the first two meats we were served: ribeye steak and bulkogi. Later, the four additional meats were brought out (brisket, then pork belly, then boneless short rib and chicken). It was way too much food for us. As such, we let some of our cooked meat stack up but the staff was very accommodating and let us work our way through all the offerings, even though we weren't polishing everything off.

In general, I enjoyed the meats. I appreciated their evident quality and that the marinated items weren't over-the-top crazy-sweet. I also appreciated that of the six, only two were marinated (chicken & bulkogi) at all. Three were straight-up raw (belly, brisket, ribeye) and one (boneless short rib) was seasoned. Not only was this a nice variety of cuts, flavors and textures but it also provided us the ability to keep going without feeling like we'd been overwrought by marinade.

At the end of the meal, we'd accumulated a substantial amount of uneaten, cooked meat and our server gestured to the menu card on the wall and mentioned something about us not being permitted to take leftovers. It was a token gesture, though. Obviously, there was nothing to be done with our cooked meats other than let us take them (or throw them away). After all, the decision had already been made when they brought out the additional meats for us to cook in the first place. And she was very friendly when she told us, shortly thereafter, that the manager said it was ok to take them. I'm guessing the fact that we'd ordered ~$25 in additional food might have had something to do with this.

Service was excellent. Everyone was friendly and several folks kept coming over to our table to tend to our meats, cut them with the big scissors, fine-tune the burner, change out the grill grate (once, after the first round), etc. Water and depleted banchan were replenished without us even having to ask.

One additional note: there's a group lunch being planned here for Tuesday 1/22. So, maybe you want to sign up for that one.

=R=

1121 Milwaukee Ave
Riverwoods, IL 60015
(847) 947-8294
http://www.kogiikogii.com

ronnie_suburban wrote:These were the first two meats we were served: ribeye steak and bulkogi. Later, the four additional meats were brought out (brisket, then pork belly, then boneless short rib and chicken).

There's a bit of a kbbq faux pas in there: marinated meat (bulkogi) should be served last, since it will coat the grill and ruin the taste of the future meats. But maybe it wasn't marinaded that heavily, or they changed grill plates.

dudefella wrote:

ronnie_suburban wrote:These were the first two meats we were served: ribeye steak and bulkogi. Later, the four additional meats were brought out (brisket, then pork belly, then boneless short rib and chicken).

There's a bit of a kbbq faux pas in there: marinated meat (bulkogi) should be served last, since it will coat the grill and ruin the taste of the future meats. But maybe it wasn't marinaded that heavily, or they changed grill plates.

Yeah, as I mentioned (but only parenthetically), they did change the grate out after the first round of meats. For that first round, the marinated and non-marinated meats cooked together but on separate sides of the grill, and didn't seem to interfere with each other too much. After that, there were two raw meats, followed by the seasoned short rib and the marinated chicken.

Personally, I don't mind when they don't change the grate because the trade-off is that the subsequent rounds of meat stick a lot less. Here, though, they insisted and we didn't protest. And doing so also helps mitigate the smoke. In any case, when in Riverwoods . . .

=R=

WOW does that look good!

Kogii Kogii is still chugging along. Our dinner last night was stellar. We waddled out of there stuffed to the gills.

PSA....the AYCE BBQ is now $22.99 + 18% gratuity.