Omoni Fresh Fast Korean Grill

My friend Suzanne asked me to try the new Korean place in Carmel—their tagline is “Fast. Fresh. Korean Grill.” It’s an interesting concept—there are a handful of different options—mainly all revolving around picking a meat choice (bulgogi beef, chicken or pork) and then adding veggies—depending on the dish dictates how many you get. There are a ton of choices, some are spicy, some are pickled, some are just steamed and then there are things like kim chi as well. The veggies are all cold and unless you order particular dishes, they are served cold with your warm rice and meat (there are also 3 different rice options). It’s basically set up taqueria style, or Subway style, where you walk down the line and make your choices as you go. If it were really busy, I’m guessing it might be a bit time consuming because there are so many options, and I’m guessing this is a type of cuisine many are not that familiar with.

I really wanted a hot dish so I ordered #2 Dolsot Bibimbap ($10.40). This is a compilation of the above ingredients in a hot stone bowl. And when they say hot, they are not kidding. This dish stayed smoking hot the entire time I was eating it. I chose steamed rice topped with the bulgogi beef, and bean sprouts, zucchini, pickled radish, spinach, and spicy radish. It also has a fried egg on top. Suzanne had a similar version with some slightly different veggies.

All mixed together

So the cool thing about dolsot bibimbap is the way the super hot bowl crisps up the bottom edge of the rice giving the whole dish an added crunchy texture. This one certainly did this in spades. You kind of mix everything together and eat it like that. We also used a lot of their seasoned soy sauce on our dishes (they give you this at the register and yes, you need to get it). There is hot sauce and regular soy that you can use at your table and I recommend a little of the hot sauce as well. Once you play with it and add some of these extra seasonings, you end up with an enjoyable, comforting dish. I wished the egg was a bit runnier just to add a little more yolkiness, but that’s me (and it kept cooking a lot in that smoking hot bowl.—I think you could put it in there raw and it would totally cook during the time you were eating it).

This is one of those cuisines that takes adding your own taste to to get it where you want it. It’s a nice thing to throw into the rotation if you live in the area and want a fast food type option, but don’t want to actually eat crappy fast food. There’s a lot more freshness about the ingredients and at least it’s more interesting than another wimpy fast food burger. I can’t say it would be a destination for me personally, being up in Carmel, and based on what I had, but I would be interested to try it again at some point. It’s also run by a family with a passion for this food, and they are helpful and eager to please—it’s nice to see. (Side note: they need different napkins! They are the size of a credit card and you need about 23 to eat a meal. This is one of my restaurant pet peeves). Anyhow, who else has been?

Omoni Fresh Fast Korean Grill

13710 N. Meridian Street

Carmel, IN  46032

317/810-1668

www.facebook.com/omonigrill/

Café Korea

Yay! Another good ethnic place a little closer to home for me!  I finally dragged the BFF out to Café Korea the other day (we have a really bad tendency to end up at the same places together a lot); it has been on my list ever since I noticed it when I reviewed the Dragon House Chinese restaurant next door.

We were greeted by an exceptionally friendly woman who told us to sit wherever we wanted.  We looked over the menu, and I have to say there are several things that look quite good.  But when the same lady came back to take our order, I decided to ask her advice. I loved the way she looked out the window to see what the weather was like, and then told us we should order the Dol Sot Bi Bim Bap because it was a nice hot dish that would warm us up.  We ordered that, as well as an order of beef Bulgogi and decided we would share.

The Dol Sot Bi Bim Bap ($8.99) was great—I really liked it.  It was a sizzling hot earthenware pot with white rice on the bottom, and topped with shredded veggies (carrots, cucumbers, sprouts, and zucchini I believe) and beef as well as a beautiful sunny side up egg.  Just before eating, you stir it all together, which cooks the egg just a bit more and gives you bits of the caramelized rice that has been a bit burnt on the bottom of the pot.  Our server made sure we knew to mix it all up before we started, but explained it in a helpful and not condescending way, which I appreciated.  It was served with a bottle of special hot sauce, which was a nice addition to give it a little heat.  I loved all those slightly crunchy browned bits of rice with the rich egg and the slightly cooked, but very thinly sliced or julienned veggies.  I would get this again in a second.

The Bulgogi ($7.99) was also quite good, but not quite as good as the first dish.  It was nice to have a bit more beef though, because there isn’t a lot of meat to the bi bim bap, and the bulgogi dish was pretty much all thinly sliced and marinated beef that was grilled—there were a few green onions, mushrooms and bits of cabbage in there as well.  The meat was nicely flavored with what tasted like a slightly sweet soy marinade, although there were a few pieces that had a little too much fat to them for my taste, but they were easily trimmed away.  I was surprised that there was no rice served alongside (and I think it was an oversight because it is listed on the menu as coming with steamed rice and a house salad for lunch, but we were fine with the rice in the other dish).  It was actually a great combo of things for two people to share, because it gave you a little more protein. 

As mentioned, they both came with house salads as well beforehand, which were your typical iceberg lettuce in a cup with a bit of a gingery dressing.  As far as these go, this one wasn’t bad and had the right amount of dressing.  Alongside your entrées, you also receive the traditional Korean side dishes, or banchan.  My favorites were the pickled bean sprouts and the wilted spinach.  The other things (one was turnip I believe and cucumbers the other) were the spicier additions. They were all nice to add a bit of acidity and heat.

But one of the things, as I have sort of already mentioned, that I liked about this place was how friendly and accommodating our server was.  She actually seemed to care about what she told us to order, and she cared about us getting the maximum enjoyment out of the food, which was quite tasty.  This is a place that I, as well as the BFF, will be back to.  She was already telling me how she wanted to take the rest of her family and was going to recommend it to her Dad, who is a fan of Korean food.

Café Korea

7262 Fishers Crossing Drive

Fishers, IN 46038

317/578-1987

www.cafekoreaindy.com

Mama's House Korean

In the mood for something different, I stopped into Mama’s Korean restaurant on the east side. Several readers have recommended it as very good Korean food. I have to say, I haven’t quite found my vibe with Korean food yet, but I can see the potential.

I ordered off of the lunch menu because they have very good
prices and you get soup along with the main dish. The prices range from $6-10 or so. The soup was a very basic egg drop soup which I have often had in Chinese restaurants. It is a chicken broth based soup with beaten eggs dropped into it which cooks the eggs lightly. It is sort of like scrambled eggs in broth. There were some scallions mixed in as well, but nothing else. The flavor was quite elemental—the broth and egg was basically the extent of it, but I liked the simplicity of it.

For my main dish I went with a traditional Korean dish—bulgogi. Bulgogi is thinly sliced and marinated beef which is then usually grilled. The marinade can vary, but is soy based. I have to say, when mine came out (served with rice and sautéed veggies) I thought I wasn’t going to like it at all. It looked like the meat would be tough and chewy. I was pleasantly surprised by the tenderness of it. You could certainly taste the soy base in the marinade. As I ate it, the meat continued to remind me of something I had before in its texture—by the time I finished, I realized it was the consistency of the meat in Italian beef sandwiches. It had that almost lacy quality of well marbled beef that Italian beef has. Again, it was simple, and not amazing or anything, but better than I expected. The veggies on the side included mushrooms, broccoli and onions which were nice to add a little more flavor into the beef. The rice was nice and sticky, which is how I like it.

You are also served, simultaneously with the meal, several banchan, or Korean side dishes as well. I was served four. One was the most traditional and well-known dishes—kimchi which is cabbage that has been pickled and fermented. This one had a lot of spicy red pepper on it, but while it was spicy, was not out of control. A bit if it along with the meat was nice as well. Two of the other side dishes included quite a bit of the same red chili laced oil. One was cubes of turnip and the other zucchini slices. They were fine, but after awhile started to taste very similar to me because of that chili sauce. The fourth dish was a nice counterpoint—thin threads of more turnip, but marinated in a slightly sweet, slightly sour sauce. This was a refreshing change to the red chili.

I enjoyed my lunch, but nothing really stood out to me. The service was super efficient and friendly, and the place was doing a decent lunch business, but I wouldn’t be clamoring to go back. They also have the Korean barbeque tables where you cook food yourself which might be kind of fun to try as well. But honestly, I can’t quite figure out if I just don’t really like Korean food that much, or if I just haven’t had really good Korean yet. I am not sure. But so far neither of the Indy Korean places I have been to have tempted me back for a second visit. I would love to hear what you all think.

Mama’s House Korean Restaurant
8867 Pendleton Pike
Indy 46226
317/897-0808
http://mamaskoreanrestaurant.liveonatt.com/

E Miracle

****THIS RESTAURANT HAS MOVED****
Looking to get out of the usual, and because a friend or two recommended it, we headed over to E Miracle in Fishers for lunch. It is one of those restaurants in a strip mall that you may drive by a million times and not know it is there. Inside though it is quite large and has a separate section to do Korean barbeque on the table which I haven’t seen since living in the Bay Area. Unfortunately, I didn’t notice it until we had already sat down and ordered or else I would have probably ordered that. It is something that is normally done there at dinner time, but the very friendly waiter told us they would happily do it for lunch as well (after all, it is raw meat they bring out for you to cook and season yourself, how hard can that be for them?).

But we ordered a Korean lunch box from the lunch menu. I ordered the chicken bulgogi and I also tried the beef bulgogi that one of my dining companions had. They came with Kim chi, fried rice (I tried it, but ordered steamed myself) and 4 pieces of California rolls. Which brings me to one of the interesting points of this menu, it really a half Korean, half Japanese (well really more than half Japanese) menu. They have lots of sushi and rolls and apparently a sushi chef who is quite talented from what I have read. However, I didn’t try the Japanese portion of the menu (other than the California rolls).

I sort wished I had though after having my bulgogi. The chicken and pork versions of this traditional dish were described as much more spicy and consisted of cut up pieces of chicken breast that were liberally doused in a red spicy sauce. The chicken was a little too dry and the sauce, while spicy, lacked much depth in my mind.

The beef bulgogi (which is really how bulgogi is traditionally served apparently) was described as not spicy and marinated pieces of beef. It was not covered in the sauce and was better than the chicken I thought, but still not overly exciting.

The fried rice was fairly unmemorable and the steamed rice a bit too hard (I think it had been sitting a bit too long). The California rolls were standard Hoosier versions of the classic with “Krab” sticks, avocado and slices of cucumber. The Kim chi (which is spicy fermented cabbage) was ok too, but nothing worth writing home about. Hubby liked it much more than I did though. (Actually, I should note that I think all of the others I ate with on this day enjoyed the food more than I did.)

Although this lunch was pretty uninspiring, I would like to go back to this place and try my own Korean barbeque on the grills and see how it is….I did do this a few times in Oakland when I worked there and besides for all the male lawyers I was with assuming I should do all the cooking, it was quite tasty. I am not going to write this place off yet, but if you go for lunch, try the dinner menu or go for sushi—hopefully it will be more interesting. I will let you know.

E Miracle
11003 Allisonville Road
Fishers, 46038
317-570-6666
(no website I could find)(But for fun, here’s a link to a site on the dos and don’ts of Korean BBQ: http://www.thefoodsection.com/foodsection/2005/04/korean_barbecue.html)