Kimchi Guys, the new Korean fast-casual restaurant from Drunken Fish owner Munsok So’s So Hospitality group, opens officially on Laclede’s Landing this Friday, February 1 (the soft opening is currently underway). The star of the menu is a new type of KFC: Korean Fried Chicken.
The grand opening will benefit the St. Louis Regional Chapter of The ALS Association, which So has supported for a number of years. All of the net profits from Friday’s business will be donated to the charity.
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The counter-service restaurant seats around 30 diners, and the menu carries a number of Korean favorites, as well as dishes that fuse Korean and Mexican tastes and ingredients. The more traditional dishes include bibimbap and four varieties of kimchi, as well as Korean fried chicken, which emerged in the second half of the 20th century. For newcomers to Korean food, So recommends a dish of Korean fried chicken with the Original sauce, paired with a kimchi side of white radish and a Korean Hite beer.
“That’s probably the most fundamental way of eating Korean fried chicken,” So says. “The quick pickle of the white radish goes really well with the fried chicken—and having a beer with that.” If you want something a little stronger than beer, sharing a bottle of soju with a friend is another tried-and-true Korean custom.
Korean fried chicken is fried twice in a starch-based batter, which makes it uniquely crispy compared to American-style fried chicken. Based on your own preference, you can order two pieces of white meat ($6.95) or dark meat ($6.50), or three chicken tenders ($6.95). Wings come in portions of 10 ($12.95) or 20 ($24.95), and if you want to try a range of cuts, you can order a half or full chicken ($11.95 or $22.95).
Kimchi Guys’ Original sauce is the perfect foil for the crispiness of the fried chicken. It’s deliciously sticky and sweet, slightly spicy and with just a little funkiness. So won’t give away the secrets to his recipe, but two of the main ingredients are gochugaru (a Korean red pepper powder) and gochujang (the sweet and spicy fermented red pepper paste used in the preparation of many Korean dishes and offered as a condiment in some restaurants). Serrano peppers add some of the heat, and there’s a little sugar and soy sauce, too. It’s hard to tire of the sauce, but if you want an alternative, there are three additional options, including Korean Buffalo, Soy Garlic, and Honey Butter.
The bibimbap bowl ($10.95) is another essential Korean dish that makes for a healthy, fresh, and filling meal. It features a bed of rice topped by your choice of protein and a mix of sautéed vegetables including julienned carrots, pickled cucumber, bean sprouts, and mushroom. A fried egg tops it off, and the dish (pictured above) is finished with scallions and sesame seeds. So says he chose to uses a short-grain rice to give a little extra chewiness, whereas most Korean restaurants use a medium-grain rice. One important piece of advice: This dish looks pretty, but bibimbap literally means “mixed rice,” so don’t get sentimental. Follow the Korean tradition of stabbing that fried egg with your spoon and mixing the ingredients well before eating. The BBQ Meat bowl ($10.95) is similar to the bibimbap, with more emphasis on the protein and less on the vegetables.
For many people who haven’t visited Korea, “kimchi” is synonymous with spicy, fermented napa cabbage. In Korea, however, “kimchi” can refer to any pickled and fermented vegetable served with a meal. Kimchi Guys offers three types of spicy kimchi: cabbage, cucumber, and radish, as well as the sweeter white radish variety. Small portions are $3.95, and larger dishes are $6.95. Other sides include kimchi fried rice, hot fries, street corn, coleslaw, and potato salad. (All are $2.95 for small servings and $4.95 for large servings.)
“You want to balance out the acid of the kimchi with some of the stronger protein flavors,” So says. “Korean fried chicken goes exceptionally well with the white radish pickle. It’s not a spicy pickle; it’s a quick pickle. It’s kind of like coleslaw with Southern fried chicken. The spicy radish goes well with our Korean barbecue, and we use our cucumber kimchi in our tacos and with our bibimbap.”
Kimchi Guys also features dishes inspired by the crossover of Korean and Mexican flavors that came out of L.A. to become a worldwide hit over the past decade. The “3 Takos” ($8.75) features a beef, chicken, and spicy pork taco. All of the tacos are dressed with cucumber kimchi, queso fresco, cilantro and cilantro mayo, but each type of meat brings out a slightly different emphasis of flavor in the dressings. The Korrito, Kuesadilla, and Nachos (all $8.75) follow in a similar vein, with such ingredients as bell peppers, street corn, and chihuahua cheese providing a Mexican complement to a choice of Korean-style protein.
If you’re a sandwich-for-lunch kind of person, Kimchi Guys has you covered, with twists on recognizable standards. Try the Bulgogi Philly, Kuban, or Korean fried chicken sandwich ($7.50 to $7.95). There are also vegan versions of the bibimbap and tacos.
Could So imagine eventually opening a restaurant fully based on traditional Korean dishes? “That’s really far ahead,” he says. “What I’m mostly excited about is introducing Korean-forward flavors to the community, being part of the community that brings a different culinary experience because I love St. Louis. Who knows where that will take us? If Kimchi Guys goes well, we might have another location further down the line. Maybe a full-fledged Korean restaurant would be exciting. But for right now, we’re concentrating on having the most top-notch quality product going out to the community.”
Though the new restaurant’s chefs don’t have Korean backgrounds, So says the key is ensuring that the kitchen is well-trained. “You want the flavor to showcase, and it doesn’t matter who’s making it,” he says. “You’ve got to know what you’re tasting for—you want a roundness of flavors. If you look in our kitchen, we’ve got recipes for everything. We weigh out and measure everything, because we want that flavor profile to repeat itself. It’s about teaching good technique around proper measurements and using proper heat to create those dishes on a consistent basis.”
Kimchi Guys is housed in the Cutlery Building, constructed in 1882 and formerly a cutlery factory owned by English-born St. Louis businessman Henry Shaw (of Missouri Botanical Garden fame). The building houses So Hospitality’s offices and was formerly the site of one branch of Drunken Fish, before the partial collapse of the building’s southern wall in 2015 prompted So to start over again. Kimchi Guys is just one plank of the building’s revival, which So hopes will play a significant role in the revitalization of Laclede’s Landing.
Last August, So talked to SLM at length about his plans for the future of the Cutlery Building, including Kimchi Guys and the 612 North events complex, which includes three stunning spaces for weddings and other events. So plans to follow Kimchi Guys later this year by opening Miss Java, a café serving specialty coffees and Liege-style waffles, in an adjacent space.
