School Food

School Food has been slowly and steadily expanding in HK, with restaurants in Festival Walk and New Town Plaza following the popularity of the first one in Times Square. School Food serves Korean food with a western twist — or, in some dishes, western food with a Korean twist. I recently went to the one at New Town Plaza more so out of curiosity than a love for Korean food.
I was here for a late lunch with a friend, who too had never been at School Food before. We ordered two dishes to share — their signature ‘blooming Mari’ and the ‘school naengmyeon’.
I had never had any sort of mari before, and when I first saw them at a Korean restaurant I was genuinely confused to see sushi served here. The mari was actually not bad — surprisingly, I liked the blend of flavors with the cheese and the teriyaki sauce, which I initially was skeptical about when I saw it on the menu. For $ 64, you get 10 pieces, which is a little overpriced in my opinion.
The naengmyeon wasn’t as special. It was pretty much just cold noodles that were spicy, but still refreshing because it was, well, cold. There was nothing really remarkable about this and it didn’t taste particularly Korean to me. My friend agreed and we kind of regretted ordering this. It wasn’t bad — I was just expecting a little more.
Overall, I’m not sure if I’ll be back at School Food as it is kind of overpriced, and the wait for if I were to come at lunch time would be way too long and not worth it. I must admit that the mari was not bad though — if I am back, I’ll definitely make it a point to try their other maris!

School Food has been all the rage in Hong Kong, and the branch in Sha Tin always seems to have the most ridiculous waiting times over the weekend. I’m adverse to anything that requires patience, so I freed up my schedule one glorious Wednesday with A, and we found ourselves at School Food once again. This time, there was no queue, but still at a 75 minute time limit for eating. 75 minutes was plenty of time for us, as we tend to inhale our food rather than the traditional chew-​and-​swallow tactic.
Perhaps you’re wondering whether the food justifies the usual hour-​long wait? The honest answer is ‘no’, but I would definitely return to School Food when the crowds subside.
The chicken gangjeong green onion salad, drizzled with mayo, was generously portioned, tender, well-​seasoned, and — unfortunately in parts — verging on undercooked. The line between succulent and salmonella was very fine, but a line nonetheless that I didn’t want to risk crossing, no matter how finger licking good the chicken was.
School Food is famous for their BLOOMING MARI, so we got the ‘Chef’s Choice’ tempura shrimp mari, which was tasty but not particularly memorable.
But God love Korean noodles. We tried their stew ramen which tasted like a $ 50 packet of spicy Korean noodles. I say that with complete respect. It had a one chili rating (out of 4 or 5?), but A said it was too spicy. I thought it was manageable.
If A was complaining about a one chili rating for the noodles, you can understand why he left me to devour the hot carbonara toppoki, or Korean rice cakes, which had a TWO chili rating. I shudder to think how spicy the FOUR chili toppoki is!!! Despite the heat, I actually loved this take on carbonara — spicy and cheesy, with bacon and rice cakes. Korea and Italy became the best of friends in this dish, and I pretty much finished this all by myself. Definitely recommend if you can handle your heat.

Okay. I personally have never been to Korea and like I said before, I have never watched any of those Korean TV shows (and I hope to remain that way). When it comes to Korean food, I have always thought of Korean Barbeque or kimchi, as I am not a big fan of spice, normally I will pass it by. However, as I was doing some window shopping Shatin, I happened to see there was one restaurant there that was super packed and filled with people lining up called School Food, which basically meant I had to go check out what the fuss was about.
I have to say thankfully I was alone that day and a table for one seemed rather easy to find. As I walked in the restaurant I could feel that so many people who got there before me was rather bitter. Anyway, before I even sat down properly, the staff already told me there was a time limit… well… I am not sure is it because I am alone or it happens to all… but that certainly did not make me feel good about this. Since time was ticking, to avoid being kicked out soon, I ordered right away not really checking the food they got to offer. I ordered quite a few dishes as I heard the portion wasn’t that much.
I ended up quite full honestly, maybe should have asked one friend to come join me. Anyways, as for the food, I loved the cold noodles as it was rather fresh, especially when it is summer time and a bit of cold soup was very nice. As for the tempura shrimp sushi, sadly the shrimp was not freshly fried and they were a bit soft unfortunately. Anyhow, I would probably visit this place again one day and try a few more dishes.