Nyla M.
Yelp
I was on my way to a dumpling house in the neighborhood but after 7 minutes of searching for parking in the pouring rain, I gave up.
Fate put me in front of this Korean specialty place and it had a parking lot! so I stopped.
This used to be a sushi joint, one more in a long line of okay sushi spots in Portland but it is now a sleek, clean, Korean soup kitchen.
Sort of like a Mongolian grill but so much better.
You choose the things you want from a long line of familiar, and some less (unless you are an aficionado of Korean cuisine, perhaps) and place them in a stainless steel bowl using clean stainless tongs
I chose bok choy, bean sprouts, black mushroom, bitter melon, long bean, spinach, parsley, bamboo shoot and a couple of veggies I don't know the name of. I added extremely fresh raw large shrimp for my protein from an array of things I can only guess at, though I recognized squid, bacon rolls, pork balls, and tofu.
You can then ask the chef to add pork belly, lamb, or beef if you want. i did not.
They weigh it and take it away. I chose stir fry instead of soup because i'd been eating homemade soup for two days.
It was returned to my table piping hot by a smiling, friendly young Korean woman, seasoned beautifully with sesame oul, chilis, garlic, perhaps a splash of cooking wine, and seasoned peanuts.
Delicious.
A man across the way from me went with the soup version and slurped happily away at his bowl.
Korean pop music played at a reasonable volume, upbeat.
It was not inexpensive. My stir fry lunch set me back $22. But it was definitely fresh, tasty, and its unlike any place else in Portland I know of.