Little Venice Gangnam Style at Gogi Korean Bar & Grill

Name: Gogi Korean Bar & Grill       

Where: 451 Edgware Road, Little Venice, London, W2 1TH, 

http://www.gogi-restaurant.com

Cost: Starters range from £4.90 to £15.50, main courses from £8.90 to £28.50, desserts are £6.90.

About: Opened in 2013, Gogi (Korean for 'meat') is on the busy Edgware Road, next to the Regent's Canal, and more or less opposite London's only Burmese restaurant Mandalay (reviewed here).

It is open 7 days a week for lunch and dinner, and it aims to serve authentic Korean meats and seafood, barbecued at your table, as well as a range of Korean staple dishes. It has a modern setting of bare brick walls, decorated in part by antique wood panels, as well as stainless steel extractor hoods over each table in an authentic Korean style I recognised from dining in Seoul.

Lighting is low, soothing, and much of it comes from cleverly concealed red strip lights. Large glass windows help to soak up the atmosphere from leafy Little Venice, making it also a great place for people watching.

What We Ate: As regular readers of this site will know, I am always on the lookout for good steak tartare, so I could not resist the Yuk Hwe (Korean steak tartare, £12.00). Gogi's version combined thinly shredded raw beef seasoned with sesame oil, served with julienned pear and an egg yolk.  This was a great start to our meal – it was fresh, well seasoned and with a refreshing crunch from the pear.

We had side dishes of Modum Kimchi (assorted cabbage, radish and cucumber kimchi, £5.90) and Modum Namul (spinach, radish, courgette and mushroom seasoned with garlic and sesame oil, £5.90), both of which were refreshing and palate cleansing.

To follow, we had Yang Yeum Chicken (£8.50); this was battered and deep fried, and served with a sweet chilli sauce.  This was disappointing - the sauce was gloopy and sweet and not spicy enough for my taste, while the batter was excessively thick, making up about 50% of each bite, and not very crispy. This is one of my favourite Korean dishes, and one I always order.

Next we had a Korean grilled barbeque, choosing the 'L.A. Galbi' (£9.90). This consisted of two slivers of beef ribs on the bone, which was barbecued on the grill set into our table.

In my opinion the quantity of beef was meagre given the price tag and considering that more than half of it was bone. We ate the ribs with a dipping sauce, wrapped up in fresh lettuce leaves with carrots and cucumber for an extra £3.50.

More successful was the Chicken Dolsot Bibimbap (£12.50). This Korean classic, served in an eartheware pot, comes with rice, sautéed seasoned vegetables, raw egg yolk and red chilli paste, the whole lot being mixed together at the table. It is one of my favourite Korean dishes, and Gogi's was excellent.

To finish our meal, we shared a portion of Tteok and Soojeaonggwa. This is a Korean rice cake, with a chilled cinnamon drink (£6.90). The rice cake was very much like a Japanese mochi, and had a delicious, intensely chocolate-flavoured mousse inside. I loved it. Even better was the Soojeaonggwa. This is a traditional Korean fruit punch, made from dried persimmons, cinnamon and ginger, garnished with pine nuts. It was my first time tasting this drink, but I'm a sucker for anything with cinnamon, and I savoured every drop.

What We Drank: We shared a bottle of Chianti Riserva 2009, Teuzzo, from Cecchi (£25.50). This was eminently quaffable and fruit-driven, without showing much complexity. The restaurant also serves a full range of cocktails, many given a Korean twist.

Likes: The setting is atmospheric, and the staff friendly and helpful with advice on ordering, grilling and even eating some of the more complex dishes. Some of the dishes were excellent, including the Korean steak tartare, the Bibimbap and the Korean rice cake (Tteok). 

Dislikes: While we loved the dessert, cinnamon drink and bibimbap, we felt that the Koren BBQ offered was a tad disappointing as was the not so crispy Yang Yeum chicken.

Verdict: A good local Korean restaurant for Little Venice and Maida Vale with some excellent dishes and great service. Recommended.

London Restaurant Reviews – Mandalay

Mandalay

Mandalay is a little institution in the London Food Scene – I remember going there 15 years ago and being rather intrigued at the time, so I felt another visit was overdue. Surrounded by the most traditional Levantine restaurants in the country, Mandalay is slightly at odds on the Edgware Road strip. Sadly, very little has changed in this restaurant’s decor and menu in the last 15 years; the food however, tasted as simple and good as I remembered it to be.             

Burmese cuisine is a difficult one to pin down – it is primarily a fusion of Chinese and Indian flavours and also to a lesser degree of other South East Asian cuisines, particularly Thai. It is rich, complex and contains most of those familiar Asian ingredients such as coconut milk, coriander, tamarind, lemongrass, curry, and shrimp paste (belacan), among others.  

We tried to order a selection of different dishes which we felt would give us a good overview of various cooking methods and flavours. We skipped the appetizers deciding to have an additional main course and accompanying vegetables instead. All dishes were served pretty much at once, by the very personable waiter and owner “Dwight”.  

The Lamb in Tamarind @ £6.90 was tender, tangy and delicious. The sauce was rich and thick with hints of cinnamon and star anise – there was a lot going on in that sauce but the flavours integrated beautifully. I really enjoyed this dish with plain boiled rice @ £1.90 a portion.  

The Chilli Chicken @ £5.90 was, as the name suggests, very hot to the point that it impaired the palate for any subsequent dishes. I love spicy food so was happy with the abundance of dry roasted chillies, and the heat that followed. This was a simple dish where the flavours of chicken and chillies were completely unadulterated by other spices. I would recommend this to those who like me, really enjoy hot foods.  

I was intrigued by Mandalay’s Twice Cooked Fish Curry @ £6.90, and was informed by the owner Dwight that the fish was firstly fried and then baked in a rich tomato sauce. We were slightly underwhelmed by this dish at the time, but having tried it at home the following day, I was pleasantly surprised by the flavours of the tomato sauce and spices. It tasted much nicer than the previous evening, so this is possibly a good take-away option!  

 

Aubergine with Potatoes @ £4.80 was one of the best dishes of the evening. The odd combination of these two vegetables, married with some exotic Asian flavours such as shrimp paste and soy sauce, was a real winner. I will certainly order this again.  

The star of the evening however was Mandalay’s banana fritters with ice cream. The batter had been prepared with a combination of wheat and rice flours making it crispy and light, melting in the mouth with the hot banana and ice cream. Utterly scrumptious!

Mandalay’s beverage menu is quite limited and well priced: with house wines priced at £8.50 and other wines at £9.90, you are unlikely to break the bank at this eatery. We decided to go for Tsingtao beers at £2.20 per bottle, and felt that they partnered the food well.

We had a lovely chat with the owner Dwight who took great pride in his country’s heritage and cuisine and demonstrated a real passion to communicate that to all his customers. He explained the menu in detail, and made me promise to try one of his signature dishes namely Calabash (fritter appetizer) on my next visit. Our experience at Mandalay was greatly enhanced by Dwight’s care, knowledge and insights.

Verdict – Good, simple Burmese food at very reasonable prices. The location and decor are a little disappointing. Dwight’s love, knowledge and enthusiasm for his country and cuisine are an inspiration to those lucky enough to be served by him.