Liz P.
Yelp
I really wanted to like this place more than I did. @chowdowndetroit posted an Instagram video of it last week, and then another friend tried it out, and everything looked delicious. Overall, the food was pretty good, but the 3.5/5 stars for the food gets taken down to a 3 due to some other issues.
What we ordered:
-Spicy Pork Bento Box (my boyfriend's meal). This had lovely presentation although was a bit pricey ($13, and $14 if you got bulgogi instead). It had white rice with purple (sprinkled?) throughout, the pork, a small salad with ginger dressing similar to what I've had at hibachi restaurants, and a small side of their popcorn chicken. Very tasty.
-Bulgogi taco: Tasty except it had a lot of lettuce and not a lot of bulgogi, also it was a little spicy ($3).
-Chicken sandwich: Probably the best value there ($6.50), you get two HUGE pieces of chicken. It was tasty except it basically tasted the same as the popcorn chicken in the Bento box.
-Corn dog rolled in sugar, with cheese inside: this was the reason I wanted to try Kimchi Box, as it looked delicious. Upon first bite it was reminiscent of elephant ears at Cedar Point. Unique, and tasted good, but not something I need to order again now.
The restaurant used to be a Pei Wei, as other reviewers have mentioned, and the layout seems to have been kept the same. It's also a fast-casual restaurant, so you place your order first (including tip) and then sit down with a number, and they bring you your food. Our food was brought in kind of an odd order ... the taco first, then the Bento box a few minutes later, and finally the chicken sandwich. The part that irks me is that our corn dogs were never brought to us; I asked the cashier about it, and people brought us bulgogi tacos, and later a few other tacos, none of which we had ordered (past the initial bulgogi taco). Another employee finally confirmed with me that it was the corn dogs we were waiting on, and about 20-30 minutes after we had placed our order, they were brought out.
Not trying to be nitpicky but our table was also kind of sticky, and the two other booths nearby hadn't been cleaned either. Hence why this is a 3-star review and not a 4-star. I'm guessing since they haven't been open that long, they are still working through some growing pains.
All that being said, overall the food was pretty good, so if I was on this side of town, I would stop by again. I forgot to mention their lemonade/iced tea: they had some pretty interesting flavors, like lemon and tumeric, which was good. Also, their dumplings looked tasty and if you like kimchi, they also have kimchi fries, and I believe a chicken sandwich topped with kimchi. However, I would not drive the 30 minutes again if the only place I was going was Kimchi Box.