Les L.
Yelp
The recent reopening of the Koreatown branch of Yangmani caught our eye so we gave it a shot for lunch at the Rowland Heights location last weekend. It is a business that specializes in dry-aged beef so we likely deviated from the best parts of its menu by ordering pork and gopchang (intestines). In our defense, we like pork and there are dedicated gopchang set menus so we figured those were a specialty as well.
We liked the variety of banchan that Yangmani offers. In addition to a salad, they have a cilantro salad, chapchae, jangjorim (a soy braised beef), radish wraps, crysanthemum stem kimchi, white kimchi, pickled onions, macaroni salad, a mung bean jelly (muk). The meals also come with 1 cheese and corn, and two bowls of rice. We added steamed egg, another bowl of rice, and the garlic leaves. One of our favorite little discoveries was a bowl on the side of the grill with soy bean paste, tofu, and ground beef. Staff explained that it could be used as a dipping sauce or mixed with the rice. It was absolutely delicious, savory, hearty, and well-balanced and we did as instructed, mixing it with white rice and it reminded us of mabo tofu.
Yangmani is full-service and the waitstaff grill for you. They do a good job and cooked the meats very well. At lunch, we had plenty of attention and no delays as they moved from meat to meat. We didn't notice anything particularly special about the porks and really didn't care for the gopchang (first timers). Overall, we had an enjoyable lunch and liked checking out the experience and new banchans.