We made it to the corner of 6th and Kenmore. Hungry, thirsty, and ready for some korean bbq. Quarters seemed to be hyped up quite a bit recently, and a couple friends had gone and said it wasn't bad.

It was a tough decision. Do I return to my beloved HangHoDong BaekJong or try out a new place for once? The line was empty for both (it was around 1400 and we were far far away from the 2 hour queue that would ensue come dinner time). My parents said, you've already been to this KangHoDong one how many times, why not try a different place?

Ah yes. Make this very difficult decision for me.

Upon walking in, I'll say that the smell is less strong than it's neighbouring kbbq place (pretty important, because after kbbq you usually smell of smoke and meat and oil. . But is it better tasting?

After they sat us down mom attempts to get her share of eye candy and wave down the servers who were all potential kpop stars (in her eyes). Dad and I flip to the drinks list and telepathically agree on the pitcher of Sapporo.

We only ordered a few cuts of meat because I expected a tremendous amount of side dishes, some dwenjang jjigae, and also the steamed egg because they give you all that (and more) at the neighbouring kbbq. We got neither. This here is a potato salad. Beside it is kimchi jeon.

This place is full service, so you don't need to do any flipping or cutting yourself (seems to be the case for many kbbqs in LA ktown though). The brisket comes first as it cooks the fastest (is that really the reason why? It just seems like brisket is always the first cut that gets served). Was just like any other beef brisket slice. Okay. Actually now that I look, I remember we ordered beef brisket and beef belly. The belly was no more amazing tasting than the brisket. At this point I wish I had gone to KangHoDong. But people are going to hate on me and say some sort of the following: "Oh what do you know, you've only gone to Quarters once", "But you only had two cuts of meat, how can you say another place is better already" Unfortunately, I must shrug and disregard those comments.

Short ribs, not marinated. One of my favs. I can't say this is the best one I've had but it wasn't bad. Okay. They gave us two kinds of greens. The leafy one here appears to have been taken with an exceptional amount of blur. My apologies. Pretty standard salad. We killed this plate of broccoli. I sometimes still have trouble spelling this cruciferous vegetable. Still trying to figure out why this place is so hyped.... *the thinking emoji face* Also the spacing and font is so messed up for this post. Why :(

I miss the having a fridge full of Korean side dishes upon coming home now that I no longer live with Korean family. And so it suddenly feels so homey whenever I have Korean meals and see all the side dishes laid out on the table.

And so homey I felt when I saw my favourite side dish - the eggplant one laid in front of me :3 (first time I had this eggplant side dish was at Korean family's and it was soooo good, and I loved it so much, Korean mom made it for me several times after that - thank you :) )

Potatoes are the sweet salty one, but the less deep fried version so you can eat a lot not feel greasy.

Kimchi is not the fresh kind but on the more fermented side. Mushrooms were also the bomb (very good)

So this is a huge chain from LA and I missed out on eating here while I was in LA.

But coworker and Korean sister was like, this place is so delicious. And that the line is ridiculous long.

Given all this hype and 2 weeks left in Cali, I made a trip with my Korean family (because they eat almost only Korean cuisine, and Gen is pretty Korean)

Somehow we got there before everyone else did and our wait time was <30 minutes. I've heard waits of >1.5 hours.

Interior is very club-like (dim), but enough lighting to take those beloved food pictures.

Well they have just about every meat you want, including my favourite pork cheek Very good

The Korean parents loved the pork large intestines.

We all loved the deboned beef short rib over the boned beef short rib (which had a much thicker layer of fat)

Pork belly was disappointing. We had all flavours, the miso, garlic, red wine, and regular. All pretty so-so.

They give you the LA style kbbq veggies - cut veggies in marinade of soy sauce, chilli, sugar, sesame oil

$27 gets you all you can eat everything = the entire menu minus drinks

Select waiter/waitresses are very nimble and accurate with what you want. Some are still new (the boy bringing out our plates of raw meats).

Will I go again? - This is probably the one/few ayce kbbq places in San Jose/Santa Clara area, so if I don't want to travel far, then yes. But getting there early is key.

I asked my Korean friend which kbbq I should go to while in LA (because he went there often to visit family), and he couldn't remember.


So he asked his mom, and his mom said the really good place closed. And also said any place is probably just as good (I mean, it is Ktown). So I yelped this place up.

And it was so damn delicious. We were extremely hungry, and the cheap cheap valet right in the restaurant parking lot was a plus because it is near impossible to find open parking on the streets of LA.

We ordered one of everything. But the things we ordered seconds of were the best.



And these were:
Brisket, bulgogi, beef short ribs



Pork belly was too thick - so it took too long to cook. Intestines were chewy no matter how we cooked them, and slicing them with the scissors was too much work for us hungry ones.

There aren't any leaves of lettuce for you to wrap the cooked meat. Instead there is a green onion salad dressed in chilli oil, sesame oil, soy sauce, sugar, which is the LA way to kbbq.

At one point the guys came here so often (at least once a week) that they were all chummy with the owner and all the waitresses/waiters.

But then they started discovering the other Asian bars (because our favourite waitress stopped working at Sake and went to O-Bar).

And I almost didn't go to Sake Bar ever again, until the guys found out they were going under reno and changed owners as well. It is now changed from Korean to Japanese (no side dishes and no creamy corn on a sizzling plate). Yes, the waitresses are Japanese too!

More upscale than Sake Bar prior to owner change, and food is better (so you can enjoy even if you're sober)

Sashimi salad. A large bed of assorted veggies and a hearty serving of chopped sashimi. Spicy, tangy, sweet dressing with a bowl of rice, mixed like bibimbap. Good

Chirashi. Chopped sashimi, avocadoes, rice and my fave Kewpie mayo. Okay

Ikayaki. Grilled squid, so tender and not chewy at all. So fun to eat sauce was good too. Good

Karaage. Pretty looking but nothing to special about taste. Okay

Nuggets cut on the diagonal, alfalfa sprouts (which are super popular in sandwiches here in Santa Clara). Just regular nuggets, no comment

We had Sapporo and Canadians that night.

Round II:

Having missed two of our beloved friends earlier, we met them at K-pocha, our Mississauga gathering place for 2-ish years.

In the past (summer time) they gave out copious side dishes, including white pickled radish, bean sprouts, spicy cold tofu.



Now its just their staple thousand island cabbage salad and buttered corn.

Best corn is still sake bar before they've changed owners and its was cheesy and buttery and sizzling on the hot plate.



K-pocha is good for food and good for drinks. We just get combos every time - the choices from the combo menu encompass all the good dishes from their overall menu. Anything spicy is good, and anything "fried chicken" is good. 

Needless to say, the spicy fried chicken is very good.


The very necessary string of Christmas lights in your Korean bar


What other comments? Let's see:

Birthdays = free shots
Spicy pork is very yummy

Well then this has become a very disappointing post - I've been trying to dig up some old food pictures from K-Pocha but can't find any.

So then I will let you decide how good this place is by going there for yourself.




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