Korean Tofu Soup

So, one of our new default lunches is Convoy Tofu House. This is one of those crossover places that the caucasians know about too - kinda like Dumpling Inn.

So here's what we almost always get:





Tofu Soup with kimchee and pork. I've gotten other versions, beef and mushrooms and one with korean sausage - it's like hot dogs. Anyway, you need the kimchee for the flavor. They give you a raw egg that you crack into the soup when it first comes all bubbly and hot. Sometimes I crack it in, sometimes I pass. It also comes with rice which you just spoon in as needed.

Here's the banchan:

These are little side dishes that you get, there are different ones at every restaurant - some are great, some have no flavor at all, but usually, if you add soy sauce it makes them taste better.

So we tried New Seoul BBQ one day, and I got the mackerel instead for like a wopping $9 or something like that. It came with this flavorless soup:





The mackerel was dried out, burnt, dead. I ate it all. But it was very unsatisfying.

So one day at Convoy Tofu House I got the dukbokki for something different:


Now this was interesting! It was hot, but that slow slow burn that you don't feel at first, but you definitely feel hours later, if you know what I mean. So it was rice cakes and fish cake and veggies and hard boiled egg. It was tasty and filling and...korean tasting.

So the Food Pimp was just getting obsessed with tofu soup. So one day we went to First Korean Market on Convoy between Dumpling Inn and Jasmine. The FP decided he was going to make tofu soup. So he got a small container of the chili paste, kim chee, veggies, we got the thin sliced pork.

So anyway, he whipped up some korean tofu soup. It tasted...korean. It was really good.




Here it is!!!!

So we also bought some frozen gyoza for appetizer. I cooked them and made a soy, chili, sesame oil sauce:


So then after that day, we were a little burnt out on Korean. We didn't go for tofu soup for almost 2 whole weeks!

So then we went to.... I think it's called Noodle Town. Well, it's on Convoy and it has 2 or 3 names...to narrow it down. It's on the same side as Jasmine, one or two shopping centers after at the end of the strip. Anyway, we both got different things. And I can't find pictures, because I think I didn't bring the camera, and we didn't bring our phones either! That's like such an amateur food blogger mistake! Either that, or it was the pictures that I emailed to myself that just look like a red lowlight blur - like amateur porn, if you will. The Food Pimp got the octopus bulgogi on the fajita platter thingy. I have to say, the FP's octopus kinda blew, texturewise. Tastewise it was delicious. But it was like they were not seared at all. They were possibly too crowded on the platter and they kinda steamed rather than grilled. And then all the liquid was just streaming off his platter and he was having a difficult time eating and simultaneously mopping up the liquid. It was just a big fucking mess.

I got the spicy pork bulgogi on a plate. OMG IWSFY! It was an a big huge round plate, and I had plenty of room to maneuver and add as much rice as I wanted. It was a fair amount of meat, but we scarfed it down. It was sweet and spicy and fatty and Deee lishus!

So that's our Korean odyssey.

I'm not going to rate these places. I'm just going to say...go to Convoy Tofu House, but don't bring your obnoxious picky friends because they'll ruin it for the rest of us. You can probably bring those obnoxious friends to Noodle Town for the all you can eat BBQ at night though. We don't do that cook at your table thing - we're cooks and we don't want to pay money to go to a restaurant to cook for ourselves. (And no, I don't think it's really fun going to Turf Club and cooking my own steak - although I do like the atmosphere at the Turf Club Next time though, maybe I'll try to pay someone to cook my steak for me). But from some of the yelp reviews that I scanned, I have a feeling some of those obnoxious people already found Noodle Town - I guess with that big banner touting ALL YOU CAN EAT BBQ $19.95 - it just lures them in!


Noodle Town
4647 Convoy St.

Convoy Tofu House
4229 Convoy St.

New Seoul BBQ
4344 Convoy St.