Daorae Korean BBQ have been actively expanding since last few years ago and till to-date, they have 11 branches all around Malaysia, including Penang, Melaka, and Ipoh. I've tried out the Mont Kiara and Puchong Bandar Puteri branch, and hope they will manage to keep up the good quality in these expansion.
The Daorae Korean BBQ occupying the first floor of three shoplot just right above the Toyota Showroom in Bandar Baru Sri Petaling.
We are a little late that day reaching the restaurant by 7.30pm and it's already packed! Look at the people that swarming the front area, but fortunately they are all seated very quickly. Lots of space.
However, as she will have difficulty to sit on the floor, so we waited at the waiting area for a proper table. It's a long 30minutes wait, I think. She pick up some magazine and I snapped away.
Individual room available if you prefer some privacy, but it's always full, mind you.
Nice green decoration at the front of the entrance, green and flow of water, good Feng Shui?
The usual messy slipper area for Korean BBQ restaurant. Some slippers belong to the waitress, so don't count.
After a long wait, finally we got our table. Clean and simple table with the all famous Korean style top smoke suction vent. The waitress sweep the table with anti-bacterial solution, that's good. But bad point is he sweep the remaining to the floor, like hawker stall.
On the menu, there are lots of choices, but it's almost the same category. Grilled meat (beef, pork, chicken, lamb), soup based, pancake, noodles and rice. That's all. If you fancy a full fledged korean dining experience, then you must order minimum 2 grilled meat as then they will serve the charcoal to grilled the meat and also free flow of korean side dishes including kimchi. That's minimum order for a pot of charcoal. If you have more diners, then no problem. But if you are just like us, two persons, follow our suggestion then.
As when we are seated, two empty cups with a bottle of tea is provided. Hey, that's a good idea, not wasting time in asking the waitress to refill the tea. The tea served is all good and there is a little rice taste in it, not sure if it's just me. We walloped the entire bottle.
The top smoke suction vent on every table. I'm not sure what's the blue handle for as you can actually push and pull the suction head by itself, maybe counterweight? Hmm...
A pot of charcoal they will be putting into the center area for cooking. Healthy way of cooking, and the smell and warmness from the pot is very nice.
3 types of sauce that's provided for the grilled meat and also a small plate of garlic. You will see as I walloped every plate. Fromt bottom to top, sweet soy sauce, ssamjang (fermented bean paste & pepper) sauce, and gireumjang (sesame oil & salt) sauce.
We ordered 2 grilled meat and the side dishes is served first. A total of 8 type of side dishes but I think there are more varieties, I just don't know how many more is available. Side dishes and kimchi is part of the Korean BBQ experience, and if you don't order the 2 grilled meat, you will be missing all these, kind of dumb if you ask me. So for two persons or small diner group, this is a must order to get all the side dishes. Just call the waitress for refill when you finish it. Our experience is a little bad as the waitress responded a little slow, mainly because the place is full and they are busy. We got what we wanted anyway.
Then come our order choice of soup. They normally serve you their daily soup but it's not good in my opinion, so we order the Dweng-Jang-Jjigae priced at RM19.00. It's a miso based seafood pot that's served with rice. We asked for less spicy and it's just nice for both of us. You will get flower-crab, tofu, potato, cucumber and some flavour ingredients with it. Best eaten hot, so don't wait. The idea of Korean food is to keep yourself busy with all the variety of foods on the table. Point of note that we pick-up in Korea is that never lift the rice bowl off the table, as they said that's how beggar eat. Leave the rice bowl on the table and pick it up with your chopstick. It's all part of the experience.
Then come our first choice of grilled meat, the Pork Special priced at RM35.00. It's chosen pork part and some of the meat is crazily fat, heavenly sinful. The pork special is basically plain pork with marinate, to taste the actual taste of the pork.
An usual sight in Daorae that they have plenty of waitress / chef to help you cook the grilled meat. They will help you to control the charcoal fire, flip the meat, and serve it when it's ready. Sometimes I love it half-cooked, so I eat also before he finish cooking. A little disturbance, but it's always nice to have your food to be cook in front of your eyes.
Pork Special that's almost done, nice texture and smell.
Once it's fully cooked, the waitress will then serve it on a plate and move on to our next order. The pork is good and the fatty part is crazy delicious. The meat is also very tender and the raw meat is so tasty in my opinion.
Make sure you get a plate of these super fresh lettuce, it's essential food for grilled meat. The lettuce are free-flow, so don't save on it. Just give a call to the waitress for refill.
How to eat? Dip the grilled meat into the sesame oil & salt sauce and place on top of the lettuce. Add on the sweet soy sauce and fermented bean paste & pepper onto the grilled meat. Adjust the quantity of the sauce according to your liking.
Then wrapped it like this. Then throw the whole thing into your mouth, it's very delicious. Good taste, healthy food with lots of green, incredible. For someone like me that don't love vegetables, it's incredible how they manage to make me pick up the lettuce pieces non-stop. You will tend to get your hands a little wet don't worry, it's just water, if you know how to wrap properly.
They also serve the grilled spring onion, a good add-on ingredients to the grilled meat wrapping experience. It's a little sour, not sure what they added though, but it's nice. Just that a little too much might kill off the taste of the grilled meat.
Next to come is the Gal-Bi-Sal priced at RM58.00. It's prime beef piece marinated with Daorae special sauce. If you are trying it, make sure you get them to serve the non-marinated first, or else it will be a little tasteless. This prime beef is super delicious and if you love medium cooked steak, then you must tell the waitress to stop cooking once it's medium done. The taste is incredible delicious, very very nice. To taste the beef taste alone, eat it without any wrapping, it's crazily nice as well.
Another wrap of prime grilled beef with spring onion. It's so nice that I couldn't help to snap another photo.
My wife looking all satisfy on her craving of Korean Food over her pregnancy. It's part of our celebration to have our 1st baby to develop properly throughout the 39 weeks. Can't wait to have him join the family soon. Sometimes I wonder if it's because the food my wife eating is too delicious, so he dont want to come out? Just a thought =P
Finally, a free piece of watermelon and a free glass of lemon barley as dessert. If you are not getting it, make sure you ask for it. The watermelon is very sweet and the lemon barley is very nice. They might be sometimes just too busy to forget, but remind them. It's worth it to close up your dinner.
The whole dinner cost us a sum of RM123.20 including 10% service charge. I'm a little surprise that such a big restaurant is not subject to government tax. Anyway definitely a plus point for my wallet and I strongly recommend this place for anyone that's craving for Korean Cuisine. It's by far the best korean restaurant that I've eaten so far and I've been their loyal follower since then. The price justify the food easily and it's brainless to write anything else, just try it out and tell me.
Daorae Korean BBQ Restaurant
21, 1st Floor
Jalan Radin Anum
Bandar Baru Sri Petaling
57000 Kuala Lumpur
Tel: 03-9057 3617
Location Coordinate: N3 04.187 E101 41.438
Present you a list of the branches around Malaysia, counted 11 by 24th July 2011.
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