Took me awhile to figure out the English name (found an article about it) of this fairly new place on Wilshire. It’s a famous Korean ramen chain. The only English used in the entire place was the tagline at the door ‘Korean Noodlebar since 1981.’
The staff doesn’t speak English, one of the waitors has his customer friend (the only one who could speak) took my order ^^;;; There’re post-its on the table for customers to write & paste. I saw a certain Chowhounder’s note. ^^;;
Since there’s not a word of English, I relied on the picture. This ramen has sausages & rice cakes. I chose medium spice level (quite hot). The noodle, the soup…taste a lot like…packaged instant noodle. ^^;; There were blocks of dry instant noodle as wall decorations.
Update: this place closed down few weeks after this was blogged.
Haha but just tasted *like* instant noodle right? I went to Koffea the other day and ordered their cheese ramen, which WAS indeed instant noodle ^^;;; But what did I expect since it was a coffee house 😛
It makes you wonder if Korean food only has those cold buckwheat noodles, and the rest is just instant noodles…
Gosh they should at least hire ONE staff who can speak English!!
cheese…ramen…? ^^:;;
That sounds sooooooo unhealthy…
How’s Koffea? I never tried that, is it just another Korean Coffeehouse type?
I think Korean noodle also has some thin and “ja-jiang mien” type of thicker noodle, though they’re pretty much variation of Chinese noodles. I think K-town is so big and ‘just like in seoul’ that for some business that the possibilities of non Korean speaking customers didn’t even cross their mind (nor they would care)…? ^^;;
Koffea is a really weird place, it’s divided into about 6 sections all with different decos as if it’s an IKEA showroom. Oh the outdoor patio looked nice though. Cheese ramen (aka Shin instant noodle with melted cheese & dry seaweed atop) aside, the desserts were… okay… ish?
I never understand how instant noodle is so popular (served in restaurant worthy) for Koreans…^^;;;
Haha can you believe it, we just went to some Korean restaurant (spoon and chop sticks? I think), and were served Shin instant ramen again ^^;;;!!! and they have Shin noodle boxes staked on the table in the corner to prove our taste buds did not kid us ^^;;;