Seconded on Boom Boom Chicken for Korean Fried Chicken.
A few suggestions for Northern, NJ:
Palisades Park, NJ
Han’ Sang Restaurant - stews, entrees, bibimbap
Fort Lee, NJ
Han Nam Bunsik - Jjajangmyun (brown paste noodle)
Teaneck, NJ
Peck Peck Korean Style Chicken
Seal/joon, are there any Korean places left in monmouth? (Excluding MOGO which I wouldn’t classify as Korean)
Yes, I remember Joonjoon from CH. 
If your going to Boom Boom Chicken in Edison next to Hmart , you might as well try the fried chicken in the Hmart, in their food court …comparable.
I agree, that’s where I get mine. I like it best from the vendor closest to the front of the store.
Not truly Korean but more Korean-American, Roosterspin has terrific fried chicken. I’ve been to their location in Westfield several times and they now have a place in New Brunswick.
Hey guys! If you want something new and good, you need to head up to the Palisades Park/Fort Lee area. The Edison area hasn’t had anything new worth talking about in a while. As far as BBQ in edison, the last time I went to Keum Ho, it was pretty disappointing. Their meat was not up to par and I have been going to Chung Sol Bat instead. I used to go to KHJ for their meat combo deals, and now that CSB also has the set deals I probably won’t be returning to KHJ for a little while.
@goodparmesan already threw out a few good places - in particular Peck Peck is a true gem and everyone who is a fan of KFC must pay them a visit.
I’ll throw out some suggestions for places outside of your mainstream Korean fare.
Edison: Meng Gao Yang BBQ. This place is like Northern Chinese lamb bbq run by Korean-Chinese immigrants. Definitely worth a visit, and the kind of place that really gets the beer flowing. The BBQ is fun but their non-BBQ dishes have always stolen the show.
Pal Park/Ft Lee:
Bang’s: There are two of them up there, and they specialize in goat stews. Their menu is small but if you order the goat combo, they will bring you out a beautiful tender piece of goat and slice it up at the table. After you’ve eaten the meat they bring you some goat stew to follow up. The stew was a little lackluster on my last visit but I would absolutely suggest trying this place if you’re tired of the usual.
To Sok Chon: This place puts out “peasant food.” The main attraction being their pork soup. It’s simply fantastic on a cold day. The soup is like 10 bucks and you can get a small order of boiled pork and blood sausage for like 3 bucks. They also have other fun things like baby eel soup.
Bada Story: This is a Korean seafood restaurant. Kind of like Sushi / Sashimi but done in a very, very Korean style. This place is pricey, but you get an insane amount of food and will get to try a ton of things unique to Korean seafood, such as live octopus.
Following are places I’ve been meaning to check out or have been really popular:
Obaltan: “Pocha” style drinking/BBQ establishment that specializes in grilled clams.
The Cast Iron Pot: AYCE Korean BBQ with 20+ meat selection for 25 bucks. Nuff said. You cook the meat over a giant traditional Korean metal pot lid.
Kang Ho Dong Baekjeong: This place has been a hot spot for a while now, it’s a BBQ chain from Korea. I personally prefer to go to locally run places.
Thanks, Joonjoon. Tho’ to read this thread, one could think that Korean dining was only fried chicken and BBQ. There’s this whole wide amazing area of soups, stews, rices, tteokbokki etc. The good stuff. While I appreciate a good full, all in meat madness BBQ, I seek the more homestyle, comfort foods. For that reason, I do like KHJ, they do those well. Since I do go with my Mom often, our dining is usually lunch.
Now that you mention it, I’m realizing I’ve only gone to Keum Ho for BBQ. I mean we obviously get other things too but I’ve always gone to CSB for non-BBQ dishes. What kind of dishes do you get at Keum Ho, and have you been to CSB? I think their food is just better than Keum Ho these days, top to bottom.
There are more and more specialty non-bbq shops popping up in the Pal Park area that are worth checking out, I like having choices but some times it’s a little overwhelming.
Bumping this up.
I had a serious yen for some Korean after all that kimchi chat and took a ride up to try out @joonjoon’s suggestion from a while ago for Meng Gao Yang BBQ which is Mongolian. We thoroughly enjoyed. I’m no BBQ expert, so this could be standard practice, but they have this smart way to rotate the skewers over the charcoal. Sadly, no napa cabbage kimchi but honestly everything was so tasty and fresh that we didn’t really miss it. Loved the pork and greens dumplings. The baby inhaled the fried rice. The service was good and they were very friendly with the baby. About $50 after tip for an order of chicken skewers, beef skewers, shrimp fried rice and 15 dumplings. We walked out stuffed. I can’t wait to go back.
I’m so glad to hear about your trip!! Last time went they were closed due to some kind of inspection or regulation, I don’t recall exactly what the deal was. They didn’t have the auto rotation skewer thing last time so perhaps they’ve remodeled. I’m glad they are back, as there’s almost no alternative outside of NYC and Pal Park for this kind of food.
I only get to this place about once a year and it’s one of my favorite places in the state… I will join you any time you’re interested! It would be a blast to have a hodown there, as there are so many items to choose on the menu.
I’m down to try this out! Looks like it is more northern Chinese cuisine than mongolian. I really don’t care but I’m just interested what the particular differences between the two cuisines are.
How does this place stack up against kimchi hana?
Yeah, my understanding is that it’s northern Chinese food, hence the mingling with Korean culture. For some reason there seems to be a lot of food called Mongolian that’s not actually what it is (the round mongolian grills, mongolian hot pot, etc).
Totally different from kimchi hana or any other Korean BBQs. As far as the meat goes, Korean BBQ I think is superior, but this style is really fun in its own way. I see Korean BBQs as feasting orgies whereas the Chinese lamb bbq is more of a delectable snack.
There are dishes here you won’t see at any other Chinese or Korean restaurant with some weird ass ingredients. I think that’s the best part of it all for me.
I’m in for a hodown. December is not a good month for me but January is good. Anything with charcoal is callin my name! Have you been to k pot yet? (Forgive me if you posted on this…had a few)
We went to the Mongolian BBQ place again last night. We had a weird experience when we arrived. I tried out a Google service where they call and make reservations on your behalf. I had no idea this was what it was but thought it was a regular reservation online. Whatever. We got there and they were insisting that we ordered a $95 lamb leg. So odd.
Anyway, they didn’t have dumplings. Unclear if they ran out or they don’t make them anymore. Had pea shoots (assuming, we ordered green beans but they clearly weren’t) which were a huge hit plus fried eggplant. Both super delicious. Lots and lots of meat on sticks.
I think this would be a fun HO down spot!
Wish I had followed @joonjoon 's advice and eaten at Meng Gao Yang this past weekend. Sounds like you had a better meal than our disappointment at Keom Ho Garden.
Paging @joonjoon any updated recommendations for Korean in Edison-ish area? I want to meet a friend up there and was thinking about the Mongolian BBQ place which we haven’t been to since pre-rona. The recent google reviews are straight up horrible.
I think the only Korean place I’ve been to in Edison since covid is Butcher 360, actually in New Brunswick. It’s an AYCE bbq and I had a really good time! It looks like their prices went up since I went and now they have a liquor license so it’s probably too rich for my taste now.
The mongolian BBQ place has always had kinda bad reviews, at least on yelp but I honestly never had a bad meal there. If you don’t pick your dishes strategically your bill can skyrocket real fast but other than that I feel pretty good that you’ll have a good time there.
You can never go wrong with Chung Sol Bat though, that place always delivers. Keum ho jung is right up there too but they change their format all the time so I can’t say with confidence how they are now.
If you don’t mind venturing into spicy Chinese food, Hot Space Grill Fish was a really great time, they have that impossible full 5 star review on Yelp too.
There’s also Picnic Garden but that place really upset me the last couple times I went by rationing the premium meats. From a quick look on Yelp it looks like the rationing has gotten worse, not better.
Good tips! Thanks. Yeah I wasn’t looking at yelp but Google reviews which had a major rash of repetitive commentary about forced tips at the Mongolian place hahaha! It did remind me of one visit where they were adamant I called to reserve a pretty pricey lamb leg which I absolutely didn’t do. I barely ever eat lamb.
I’ll check your spots. I need to hit hmart in Edison for a variety of ingredients since I volunteered to trial a couple recipes that are well outside of my normal cooking.
Well I hope you have fun and please report back! My friends and I like to try to hit 2 restaurants when we go to Edison, and the Mongolian place is nice for that kind of thing because you can get a few skewers just like as a snack. That lamb leg is actually super delicious but I don’t think it’s worth the money.
Also if you haven’t tried the crab and pork soup dumplings at Shanghai Dumpling house it’s an absolute must!
