Korean street food in Koreatown

Koreatown in Los Angeles is one of the few places outside Korea where the street food is not a novelty item on somebody’s fusion menu. It is dense, it is largely built for Korean customers rather than for visitors, and a lot of the best things in it are sold at counters rather than in restaurants.

If you have never eaten Korean street food, here is what the category actually means and what is worth ordering first.

What counts as street food

In Korea it means food sold from a cart or a stall — pojangmacha — eaten standing up, cheap, fast and usually with your hands or a single skewer. It is not a lesser version of restaurant food. Several of the dishes below have no restaurant equivalent at all; the stall is the only place they exist.

Tteokbokki

The one to start with. Cylinders of rice cake, chewy in a way that has no real Western analogue, in a sauce of gochujang, sugar and stock that is sweet and spicy in roughly equal measure. It is the default Korean street food — the thing sold on every corner, eaten year-round, and the dish most Koreans have the strongest childhood memory of.

The heat is moderate and rounded rather than sharp. If you are worried about spice, this is much gentler than its colour suggests. We make it at the counter.

Yubu chobap

The counterweight to tteokbokki, and the thing to order alongside it. Seasoned rice in a sweet pocket of braised fried tofu, eaten cool, no sauce. Where tteokbokki is hot and spicy, this is cool and sweet, and the two together are a better meal than either on its own.

It is also the most portable food in the neighbourhood, which is why it turns up in lunchboxes. Here is what yubu chobap is in more detail.

What to order if it is your first time

One tteokbokki and a plain yubu chobap. Between them you get the two poles of the category — hot and spicy, cool and sweet — and neither requires you to have a view about Korean food beforehand. Add a topped yubu, bulgogi or salmon, if you want something more substantial.

Where we are

KingYubu Madang Mall is on South Western Avenue, inside Madang Mall. Hours, directions and the address are here, and the full menu is here.